Guides: Art: Encyclopedias & More

What Are Reference Sources?

Reference sources include encyclopedias, dictionaries, atlases, directories, and other succinct background or factual materials to aid in research. Use reference sources to:

Find a succinct overview of a topic.
Help you identify a topic to explore in depth.
Access quick, reliable facts.
Find bibliographies that will lead you to detailed studies.

Encyclopedias

Oxford Art Online This link opens in a new window
Contains Grove Art Online, today's foremost scholarly art encyclopedia covering all aspects of Western and non-Western visual art. It includes the full text of The Dictionary of Art, edited by Jane Turner (1996, 34 volumes) - the landmark reference work containing more than 21,000 biographies and 500,000 bibliographical citations contributed by 6,700 scholars from 120 countries. Grove Art Online articles and bibliographies are regularly updated. It also includes images and provides access to The Oxford Companion to Western Art, Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, and The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms.

Dictionaries

Art & Architecture Thesaurus Online
The AAT, a part of The Getty Vocabularies, is intended to provide terminology and other information about the objects, artists, concepts, and places important to various disciplines that specialize in art, architecture and material culture. The AAT contains generic terms to describe these subjects. The AAT contains no iconographic subjects and no proper names.

Bibliographies

Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA)
BHA is a bibliography available through The Getty Research Library Catalog, which provides a list of thousands of resources. To access materials listed in BHA, do a title search of the item of interest in LibrarySearch or submit an Interlibrary Loan request.

Biographical Information

Gale In Context: Biography This link opens in a new window
600,000+ biographies covering more than 525,000 individuals. Includes 170+ Gale reference titles, periodical information and multimedia content.

Union List of Artist Names Online (ULAN)
A part of The Getty Vocabularies, ULAN is intended to provide terminology and other information about the objects, artists, concepts, and places important to various disciplines that specialize in art, architecture and material culture. The ULAN includes proper names and associated information about artists.

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography This link opens in a new window
Over 60,000 biographies, 72 million words, 11,000 portraits of significant, influential or notorious figures who shaped British history