"Young America" Art:

Finding books:

Keyword searching (k=painting American or k=robert duncanson) of the online catalog is easier than specific LC (Library of Congress) searching. Keyword searching may turn up more titles, but you can quickly weed them out; be sure to take note of key authors for your topic and look for other books, exhibition catalogs, or periodical articles by them.

Finding periodicals:

(Magazine/journal) articles on your topic: you may search Art Full Text. This index covers articles published 1984 to date. Art Index Retrospective covers 1929-1984. On the Libraries E-indexes page, you will also find useful information in:

      Grove Dictionary of Art Online, which has image links
      America: History and Life
      Historical Abstracts
      Poole's Plus: Digital Index of the 19th c.

Full-text, searchable E-journals on the Libraries Web page are also an important and growing feature. Look on the drop-down menu under Art or American Studies or History and you'll find many. In addition, search these large full-text journal collections:

      Academic Search Premier
      IngentaConnect
      JSTOR
      Project Muse

Basic Reference Sources:

Dictionaries such as the Yale Dictionary of Art and Artists

Bibliographies such as Karpel, Arts in America: a Bibliography, which is out of date but still very useful.

Encyclopedias such as the new Grove Encyclopedia of American Art before           1914

Periodical Indexes such as Index to 19th C. American Art Periodicals

Biographical Dictionaries such as NYHS Dictionary of Arts in America 1564-          1860

Collection Catalogs such as American Paintings of the Eighteenth Century (National Gallery of Art) and, of course, your text, Young America: Treasures from the Smithsonian American Art Museum (on reserve in Art Library).

Return to the top

Finding Images:

Illustrations of art works can be found using painting indexes such as World Painting Index (blue books on the Ready Reference Shelves near the computer area). But images are also readily accessible via the growing number of museum or image web sites, many of which you can search by topic in addition to artist. ARTstor provides curated collections of art images and associated data for noncommercial and scholarly, non-profit educational use. CAMIO offers rights-cleared, high-quality art images for class projects, art history and studio art programs, course Web sites, lectures, presentations, and research resources. You can also use the already-mentioned Grove Dictionary of Art Online, which has a large and growing image base.

Important Web Sites:

Since Young America is a Smithsonian exhibition, the Smithsonian Web Site will be an invaluable resource for you. This site acts as the gateway to all the Smithsonian museums and libraries. Or, you can go directly to one of the Smithsonian's many important sites for American art:

Inventory of American Painting for paintings executed before 1914. Be sure to look at the long view, which may include bibliography.

Smithsonian American Art Museum. Images of more than 4000 objects in the collections and exhibitions, with artist information.

National Portrait Gallery collection can be searched by artist (e.g. Paul Revere) or sitter (e.g. George Washington.)

Other sites to look at for American art, to compare and contrast with your Smithsonian work are:

Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts the oldest museum and art school in the U.S., with an outstanding collection of American art.

National Gallery of Art. Search by artist or by topics such as portraits, genre, religious, landscapes, etc. A large image database.

Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco "the largest searchable art imagebase in the world" with more than 12,000 artists represented.

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston for a major collection of American artists, e.g. Trumbull, Sargent, Eakins and others.

Library of Congress 'American Memory' site and Prints and Photographs Division may also be useful.

Close to home, Reynolda House in Winston-Salem has one of the best collections of American art in the Southeast. The North Carolina Museum of Art also has American art as do many of the smaller museums throughout the state.

For worldwide access to museum web sites see Virtual Library Museums. Finally, you can also try image searches like the Google Image Search Engine which provides access to a growing number of images on the web.

For help in writing

For help in writing about art see the handy reserve book, Barnet's Short Guide to Writing about Art or check out the Writing Center's Guide online

Return to the top