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ARTH 275: Design Research Guide

Liaison Librarian

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Cory Laverty
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Bloomsbury Design Library

Scholarly coverage of the history, theory and practice of crafts and design worldwide, from 1500 BCE to the present day, with cross-searchable access to authoritative reference works, e-books, and museum object images. Explore the history and context of influential design schools, people, periods, places, and disciplines. Includes:

  • Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Design: global coverage from 1800 to the present by international design scholars and historians from museums and exhibitions, art and design schools, journals and department stores. Covers graphic, textile, furniture, metal, ceramic, fashion, stage and film, and vehicle and product design, and also national histories of design and key design movements.
  • Encyclopedia of East Asian Design: Coverage of arts and crafts, interior, graphic, and design objects for domestic, regional, and global consumption across regional and national histories and geographies.
  • World History of Design: global design from prehistory to the end of the Second World War. Includes: earliest cave art and human tools; examples of visual and material culture from beginnings of civilization, to the Industrial Revolution, to WWII.

Key Art History Indexes & Databases

For 1907-1984 coverage see: Art Index Retrospective
Index to scholarly journal articles on art and related disciplines (anthropology, architecture, design, video art, etc.). Emphasis is on Western art. Can be searched simultaneously with Art Index Retrospective.
 
Index to scholarly art journals and other materials published prior to 1985. Can be searched simultaneously with Art Abstracts.
 
Citations and abstracts to journal articles, books, essays, exhibition catalogs, dissertations, and exhibition reviews on modern and contemporary arts dating from the late 19th century onwards, including photography since its invention.
 
Comprehensive index to articles on architecture and design published in scholarly and popular-press American and international journals.
 
Comprehensive index to European and American art from late antiquity to the present. Abstracts books, articles, conference proceedings, essays, dissertations, exhibition and dealers’ catalogues. Covers painting, sculpture, drawing, prints, architecture, crafts, decorative, applied, graphic, folk and popular arts.
 
IBA succeeds the Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA). Abstracts 500+ core journals, monographs, essay collections, conference proceedings and exhibition catalogues. Covers European art since late antiquity; American art since the colonial period; global art since 1945; fine art in all media; decorative arts and antiques; museum studies and conservation; archaeology and material culture; folk art; architectural history.

Databases relevant to Art history

History of Canada, U.S., Latin America from pre-historic times to the present, covering journals, books and dissertations on history, culture, government and political science, ethnic studies, folklore, international relations and current affairs.
 
Architectural information and citations to periodical articles and books about Canadian architects and their Toronto buildings, parks, and built environment up to 2002.
 
Covers Indigenous North American culture, history, and life
 
CBCA (Canadian Business & Current Affairs)
Includes selective full text titles, covering current events, the arts, indigenous and Canadian studies, business, science, and academic information produced in Canada.
 
Access to several primary source collections of digitized materials from disparate parts of the world
 
Full text in PDF format for most of the dissertations and theses added since 1997 and strong retrospective full text coverage for older graduate works
 
Interdisciplinary topics related to gender studies, including art
 
Comprehensive index for historical studies worldwide EXCLUDING the United States and Canada.
 
 
A bibliography of books, journal material, dissertation abstracts and essays in books (including conference proceedings, Festschriften, encyclopedias and exhibition catalogues) for the study and teaching of the Middle Ages and Renaissance (400-1700).
 
Journal Storage, the Scholarly Journal Archive full-text access to the entire "backrun" of many core academic journals in the humanities, social sciences, business, and law. There is a moving wall of 2-5 years before the current volume.
 
Multidisciplinary database providing access to bibliographic information, author abstracts, and cited references from scholarly journals and conference proceedings. A cited reference search enables you to find articles that cite a previously published work.
 

Fasion and Race Database: The goal for the database is to center and amplify the voices of those who have been racialized (and thus marginalized) in fashion, illuminate under-examined histories and address racism throughout the fashion system.

Fashion History Timeline, Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, Open-access source for fashion history knowledge, featuring objects and artworks from museums and libraries that span the globe. Entries on specific artworks, garments, and films.

Art Image Tools

Artstor (digital image library for educational and scholarly uses. To use ARTstor to its full advantage (both on or off campus), you must first become a "registered user")
 
Index of Medieval Art

Formerly known as Index of Christian Art. Important archive of medieval iconography, from Princeton University. 

Oxford Art Online (includes Grove Art – limit 8 users)