Research Guides: Art &amp; Art History: ARTH 400

Getting Started

Use Interlibrary Loan to request books, book chapters, or journal articles from other libraries. Usually it takes 1-2 days to receive an article or book chapter, and 1 week to receive a book.

Research tools have different uses, so check in many places. For example, Art & Architecture Source and Art Index Retrospective are focused on art-related topics, while ProQuest Central is a more general database that includes articles and journals on a wide variety of topics. MUSCAT Plus is the library's catalog and way to cast a broad net to start your research, while WorldCat searches many libraries across the world.
Save time by consulting reference materials for finding background information on your topic before you get too deep. Oxford Art Online (formerly Grove Art Online), GVRL, and Wikipedia can be good places to start.

Browse the book collection in relevant call number areas to find additional titles. You can often find a lot by finding one book that interests you and looking at the books surrounding it. You can browse ebooks with nearby call numbers at the bottom of a book record in Muscat Plus.
Use bibliographies at the end of articles/chapters to lead you to additional sources. This is a great way to see the scholarly conversation around a topic. Use what has been done before you.

Consult your style guide often to check formatting, citation styles, etc.
Use a citation manager (such as Zotero) to organize your sources. This will save you time.

Schedule a meeting with a librarian to get one-on-one help. These are 30-minutes and can be in-person or via Zoom.
Prefer email? Send your question to ask@gettysburg.edu.

Art & Architecture Source This link opens in a new window
Covers a broad range of art-related subjects, from fine, decorative and commercial art to various areas of architecture and architectural design. Provides detailed indexing and abstracts for an array of journals, books and more; contains over 750 full-text journals and 220 full-text books, plus an image collection of over 63,000 images (from Picture Desk and other sources). International in scope--includes periodicals published in English, French, Italian, German, Spanish and Dutch. Early 20th century to present.
Art Index Retrospective This link opens in a new window
Indexes content from over 600 publications. Cites articles, exhibitions, film reviews, and art-related material published from 1929-1984.
Bibliography of the History of Art This link opens in a new window
Provides access to BHA (Bibliography of the History of Art/Bibliographie d'histoire de l'art) and RILA (Répertoire de la litterature de l'art), together covering material published between 1975 and 2007. BHA includes articles from over 1,200 journals.

JSTOR This link opens in a new window
Provides access to content across all disciplines. Search or browse books, journals, images, and primary sources.
ProQuest Central This link opens in a new window
Provides access to thousands of full-text scholarly journals, trade and professional titles, newspapers, magazines, dissertations, working papers, case studies, and market reports. Content covers all major subject areas, including business, health and medical, social sciences, arts and humanities, education, science and technology, and religion.
Historical Newspapers This link opens in a new window
Provides full-text articles from the Baltimore Afro-American (1893-1988), Chicago Defender (1905-1975), Chicago Tribune (1858-1993), Los Angeles Times (1881-1993), New York Times (1851-2013), Philadelphia Inquirer (1860-2001), Pittsburgh Courier (1911-2002), Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (1786-2003), San Francisco Chronicle (1865-1922), Wall Street Journal (1889-Current), Washington Post (1877-2000), The Guardian (1821-2003), and The Observer (1791-2003).
ARTstor This link opens in a new window
Artstor’s collections and key functionality are now available on JSTOR. Explore Artstor’s collections of high-quality images, curated from leading museums and archives around the world. Artstor’s diverse collections are rights-cleared for education and research, and include Open Access content as well as rare materials not available elsewhere