Library: Art and Design Databases: Image Collections

Top Databases

Art Project (powered by Google) This link opens in a new window
Explore museums from around the world.
ARTSTOR Public Collections This link opens in a new window
Freely accessible images, videos, documents, and audio files from library special collections, faculty research, and institutional history materials, as well as open access images from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Metropolitan Museum of Art This link opens in a new window
Discover over 440,000 high resolution images of items from the Met's collection.

Smarthistory
Smarthistory’s free, award-winning digital content unlocks the expertise of hundreds of leading scholars, making the history of art accessible and engaging to more people, in more places, than any other provider.

Art Images for College Teaching (AICT) This link opens in a new window
Images of art and architectural works in the public domain that are free to use.

Index of Medieval Art (FREE THROUGH JUNE 1ST)
The collections include images and descriptive data related to the iconography of works of art produced between early apostolic times and the sixteenth century. The collection now includes secular subjects as well as a growing number of subjects from medieval Jewish and Islamic culture.
Information Aesthetic
a pragmatic & delightful online index intended to inform, enlighten, engage and inspire

National Gallery of Art This link opens in a new window
Click on the "images only" box to limit search.
New York Public Library Digital Library This link opens in a new window
Images and information on artworks and objects from the NYPL's collections related to the arts.
University of Minnesota Image Guide This link opens in a new window
Provides links to databases of images in the world of art, as well as the humanities, social sciences and hard sciences.
Visual Arts Data Service (VADS) This link opens in a new window
Includes images that are freely available and copyright cleared for use in learning, teaching and research. UK-based.
Web Gallery of Art This link opens in a new window
Virtual museum of European painting and sculpture of the Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Neoclassic, and Romantic periods (1000-1850).