Studio Art Resources: Researching Artists

A basic introduction to information resources for visual artists.

Finding Books & Exhibition catalogs on Artists

The KU Library Catalog can be searched by artist's name to reveal various publications available on individuals.

To learn of books and exhibition catalogs published on an artist that are not owned by KU but available through Interlibrary Loan, search the database WorldCat. This resource functions as a massive catalog of books in thousands of libraries all over North America.  

The Cleveland Institute of Art's Contemporary Artists Index (CAI) allows you to search the contents of over 1400 exhibition catalogs by artist's name or by catalog title. By searching the artist's name, you discover not only the catalogs from the artist's solo exhibitions but also the catalogs for group shows that included the artist's work.   

Interviews & Statements

"Hearing" directly from the artist about his/her artwork can be an important step in understanding the work. The term "interviews" is a subject heading and can be combined with an artist's name when searching the Library Catalog. The Robertson volume (listed below) is a bibliography of citations to such interviews and statements. You can also find compilations of interviews in books or interviews may be included in journal articles that you find through indexes such as Art Index or Art Bibliographies:Modern

Artists' Biographies

Oxford Art Online Logo

Oxford Art Online Online encyclopedia great for finding information about individual artists and movements. Includes the important and comprehensive Grove Dictionary of Art. Full text.

AskArt A good place to find information about lesser-known American artists and view reproductions of their work. Entries include bibliographies. 

Arts:Search Includes Arts + Architecture ProFILES, a biographical dictionary of modern designers, craftspeople, artists and architects.  

the-artists.org Based in Portugal, this free site lists 10,000 famous, established and emerging modern and contemporary artists with their portrait, biography and/or portfolio and links to webresources. Can be search by movement, school, style, medium, or art prize

Marquis' Whos Who on the Web Biographical information about more than one million individuals in more than 800 occupations using a single search and updated daily.

Finding Articles on Artists

Journal articles on articles can be a rich source of information, especially for artists who are not well documented in books. A researcher has a choice of looking in a citation index that covers art magazines specically and then using KULINK to locate the online or print version of the article OR starting with a general index that may cover many fewer art articles but immediately presents the online article. The choice may be made based on how thorough and how much time the researcher has available.

Suggested Art Indexes (citations only):

Art Index Indexing of art, architecture, & design publications; also references for artworks that appear as illustrations for articles or in advertisements.

ArtBibliographies Modern Citations with abstracts covering all aspects of modern and contemporary art from mid-19th century-present.

Design & Applied Arts Index Indexes more than 500 design and craft journals; especially good for information on designers and craftsmen.  

Suggested General Indexes (full text):

Academic Search Complete Indexing and abstracts for more than 13,000 journals, with full text for more than 8,750 of those titles, over a broad spectrum of subjects.

Proquest Research Library Indexes more than 2550 full text general interest magazines and scholarly journals, trade publications, magazines and newspapers.

Wilson OmniFile Select Full text of articles from approximately 2,700 publications covering all subjects.

Some Biographical Dictionaries of Artists

There are literally hundreds of specialized dictionaries of artists. Some document artists who lived at a particular time or in a specific place; some record artists who worked in a particular medium or style. These can be found in the Library Catalog.

You can also use Oxford Art Online, AskArt (expecially good for American artists), or Design ProFILES (part of Designinform and especially good for craftspeople and designers.) 

Here are a few  examples of published dictionaries:

Writing about Art

Marks, Andrea S. Writing for Visual Thinkers a Guide for Artists and Designers. Berkeley, CA: New Riders, c2011. An e-book designed to help people who think in pictures gain skills and confidence in their writing abilities.

Writing about Art A tutorial prepared by Marjorie Munsterberg of City College, New York, and intended to help students improve their ability to write about visual things.

Barnet, Sylvan. A Short Guide to Writing about Art. 10th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Prentice Hall, c2011. Useful guide that is now in its 10th edition. Shows how to analyze art and suggests tools needed for effective writing.