Ingalls Library & Museum Archives

This index is the type of reference text that librarians and researchers rejoice over.  The A.C.I. was compiled and realized by Noelle Corboz and Cécile de Pebeyre under the direction of Marc Blondeau and Thierry Meaudre.  The subtitle defines it succinctly, “Catalogues Raisonnés & Critical Catalogues of Artists 1780-2008,” and further, “Painting, Sculpture, Works on Paper, Prints, Contemporary Media.”  Entries are alphabetical by artist name, with place and date for birth and death.  Bibliography proceeds chronologically from date of publication, with separation for genre.  Details of publication are included, as well as ISBN number.  A thoughtful introduction tracing the history and evolution of the catalogue raisonné written by Rainer Michael Mason is also presented.  An author index follows, linking to the corresponding artist.  Prior to the release of this volume, art reference librarians relied on the Wolfgang M. Freitag text Art Books: A Basic Bibliography of Monographs on Artists, published in 1997.  This more up to date volume will indeed be a boon to research.  The A.C.I. will be shelved behind the reference desk for ease of access.

This recently published three volume set is, like so many previous Grove volumes, immediately essential.  The Encyclopedia of Islamic Art and Architecture fills in an unoccupied space in the reference collection, covering topics heretofore not published in a single volume or set.  Entries are concise but thorough, with up to date bibliography.  Illustrations and photographs are in black and white.  An index follows in the third volume.  One cannot overlook the most obvious, but perhaps most important aspect of this set; it is published in English.    The volumes reside in the reference collection, where they will certainly be appreciated.  N6260 .G75 2009

Newly added to the Library’s electronic resources list is the Dictionary of Art Historians.  This source serves as a starting point for researching major figures in art history, both active and inactive.  As explained in the information page, it is a work in progress.  But for its part, it provides ample background into the academic training and methodology of the entries, for example here is a selection from the the entry on Panofsky, “Though Panofsky is considered the “ur-iconologist,” his methodology was diverse and is difficult to summarize.  Primarily a scholar of medieval and northern Renaissance art, he is most frequently associated with the concept of iconography, matching the subject-matter of works of art to a symbolic syntax of meaning drawn from literature and other art works.”  Each entry includes relevant dates and locations, as well as extensive bibliography where applicable.

The portrait miniature is a form that developed from manuscript illumination in the 16th century in Europe and continued for over four hundred years.  Its practitioners worked predominantly in watercolor and gouache on vellum and ivory, but also in enamel.  The Cleveland Museum of Art has an extensive collection of portrait miniatures a selection of which are on display in the gallery of British art in the 1916 building.  The following is a bibliography of important texts on English and Continental portrait miniatures.

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The Index to 19th-Century American Art Periodicals is the sole online index to 42 art journals published in the U.S. during that century.  As the name implies, the index covers 1800-1899.  It provides essential information on artists and illustrators, painting, sculpture, drawing, photography, architecture and design, exhibitions and sales, decoration, and collecting.  The index contains more than 26,000 records. To access the Index to 19th-Century American Art Periodicals, click Search Collections and then View Online Resources.  Instruction in this resource is available through the Reference Desk.

Hall’s Dictionary of Subjects and Symbols in Art is the definitive dictionary on the iconography Western art.  The new edition contains an expanded index of religious beliefs, ideas, and social customs, as well as a select number of line drawings which illustrate the text.  Extensive cross referencing makes this volume invaluable.  In his introduction, Kenneth Clark suggests, “Mr. Hall’s book is intended to help the non-specialist art lover to look at pictures and sculpture with more understanding.  It contains much that anyone of average education and over fifty years of age will know already.  It also contains a good deal that is new to me, and so, I suppose, will be unfamiliar to some other readers.”  Following its term on the recent acquisitions table, this book will be in the reference collection.  N7560 .H34 2008

Catalogo Dei Librari D’Arte E D’Antichita is the catalog of the library of Conte Leopoldo Cicognara, held at the Vatican.  Because the title is long and complicated, it is often referred to simply as Cicognara.  The text is a guide to the microform collection, which the Ingalls Library holds in its reference collection, of roughly 5000 books on Art, Archaelogy, and related subjects.  The Cicognara Library collection includes books published from the birth of printing, until the nineteenth century.  It is considered one of the premier collections of its kind, thanks to the judicious selections of the Conte Cicognara.  Born in Ferrara in 1767, Leopoldo Cicognara was an artist, as well as a critic, historian, and theorist.  He published works on numerous topics, including his Storia della Scultura, available within the Cicognara microform collection.  Notably, he was the president of the fine arts academy in Venice, and helped to establish the Galleria dell’Accademia in Venice.  He died in 1834.  Thanks to a collaboration between the Vatican and the University of Illinois, this collection is available in multiple libraries worldwide.

Identifying artist signatures and monograms is a challenging task. Within the loops and flourishes, scribbles and scratches, there is hidden a name. Often, the most difficult part is simply determining which letter is which. Thanks to an ever expanding number of texts in the Ingalls Library collection, this research is a bit easier.

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The Ingalls Library has reacquired access to the Encyclopædia Britannica Online.  This resource is available via the Electronic Resources list, by clicking Search Collections and View Online Resources.  In addition to this version, the Library maintains three Encyclopædia Britannica sets in the reference room, the Eleventh Edition, the Fourteenth Edition, and the Fifteenth Edition.  This last set is called the Macropædia, in that it spends more time covering fewer topics.  Or as the spine reads, Knowledge in Depth.  It also serves as an example of why a library needs three sets of Encyclopædia Britannica.  Each one is a little different.  In so much, the online Britannica offers greater avenues of access to information, via keyword searching, indexing, and in text linking.  The resource is further enhanced by the inclusion of the Merriam Webster Dictionary, Thesaurus, and Notable Quotations.

Hidden in plain sight in the reference collection is George Redford’s Art Sales, N8675 .R4 V.1-2. Or if you like long full titles that tell you exactly what something is, Art sales. A history of sales of pictures and other works of art. With notices of the collections sold, names of owners, titles of pictures, prices and purchasers, arranged under the artists of the different schools in order of date. Including the purchases and prices of pictures for the National Gallery. Look for the two volume set bound in bright green cloth. The title is in brown on the spine and the cover. It is rather ironic that a book with such vivid description is so nondescript on the outside. Published in 1888, this catalog serves as a reference to early British art sales at public auction, using catalogs from the British Library, Christies, and other sources. The arrangement is quite diverse. In so much, there are listings by collector and by artist. The latter is divided into a number of categories, by country, as well as medium. The headings for collectors are quite interesting in that they include extensive documentation of the collection, as well as rather pithy description of the contents of the estate. There are also a number of essays on collectors present. The work here is expanded by Algernon Graves in a book with an equally wordy title, Art sales from early in the eighteenth century to early in the twentieth century (mostly old master and early English pictures), or simply Graves Art Sales, at N8675 .G72 v.1-3. While the Graves volumes increase the organization, it is at a cost of the descriptive passages. There are also corrections to the original text.