COLLECTIONS:

Special Collections

University Archives

Collection Preservation

Research Collections:
Fine Arts Collection

Collection Overview
The fine arts collection, housed in Bapst Library supports the study, teaching and research needs of faculty and students in the Fine Arts Department and other disciplines, as well as the cultural needs of the university community in general.  The collection covers the areas of the history of art and architecture from prehistoric times to the present along with museum studies, and photography.  Many of these areas overlap with other academic departments, namely English, Philosophy, History, Romance Languages and Literatures, Classical Studies, Communications.

The collection includes both monographs and serials to support the study of fine arts on the advanced undergraduate level.  Special areas of emphasis within the collection are Italian renaissance art, Netherlandish art, American art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Irish art, ecclesiastical art and architecture, and photography.  The collection also contains the extensive library of the late Art History Professor, Marianne Martin, an expert in the area of futurism.   In the near future, greater emphasis will be focused in the areas of Islamic and Asian art.  The collection also supports the curatorial work of the McMullen Museum of Art, which is located in Devlin Hall, and is under the auspices of the Fine Arts Department.

Access is provided to every major art and architecture index in their electronic format.  To further support the study of art history in this electronic age, images of works of art in digital format are also provided.  Boston College was an initial university participant in the AMICO Project and continues its subscription.  Further access to images is achieved by the selection and organization of well-chosen web sites.   The next area of  collection growth in electronic form will be in electronic journals.

Adeane Alpert Bregman
Bapst Art Librarian
1-617-552-3136
E-Mail: bregman@bc.edu

Selected Resources

In the Bapst Library:

• Catalogues raisonnés of major artists:  Bonnard, Caillebotte, Caro, Cézanne, Dali prints, Daumier, Degas sculpture, Ensor, Gainsborough, Goya engravings and lithographs, Hopper, Klee, Magritte, Manet graphic work, Monet, Matisse, Pollock, Pontormo, Remington, Rothko, Rossetti, Soutine, Giambattista and Domenico Tiepolo, Van Gogh, Velázquez, Vermeer, Vroom, Warhol prints, Whistler, and others.

• Important sets: Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard (Peter Paul Rubens; ) Dumbarton Oaks Papers; Corpus of Florentine Paintings;  Early Netherlandish Painting; Ars Hispaniae.

• Over 200 journal subscriptions with extensive holdings in art historical literature, many from the first volume through the current issue.  Bapst Library is one of few libraries in the United States to hold the complete run of Circa Art Magazine: Irish and International Contemporary Visual Culture.

• Microform sets: Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires Preserved in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum; Lewis Wickes Hine's Interpretive Photography at the International Museum of Photography at George Eastman House; British Masters of the Albumen Print: A Selection of Mid-nineteenth Century Victorian Photography.

• Reference works: Allgemeines Lexikon der Bildenden Kunstler (Thieme-Becker); Codices Latini Antiqueres; Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC).

On the Web (Unrestricted Access)

• Web directory (produced at Boston College): Irish Art Web Site: An Online Directory of Irish Art, Artists, and Resources.

On the Web (Restricted to the BC Community):

• Subject indexes to the literature:  Art Index and Abstracts, Bibliography of the History of Art, Avery Index to Architectural Periodicals, Art Bibliographies Modern, Index of Christian Art.

• Reference work: Grove Dictionary of Art.

• General indexes: Arts & Humanities Citation Index (Web of Science), Expanded Academic Index ASAP (InfoTrac), FRANCIS Bulletin Signalétique.

• Full text electronic journals: Some electronic journals in art history  may be found at the following e-journal gateways: JSTOR and Project Muse.

• Other databases in the humanities: Subject Indexes to Online Databases: Humanities.  This web page also has links to databases outside the humanities.

Research Guides
More information about available resources can be found in the following resource guides: Research Guide: Art History, Research Guide: Architecture, Research Guide: Art Biography, Irish Art, Research Guide: Careers in Art, Research Guide: Medieval Art and Manuscripts, Research Guide: Research at Bapst Library, Research Guide: Research Paper, Research Guide: Works of Art Information, Research Guide: Iconography.

Interdisciplinary Elements of Subject Area
The resources of the fine arts collection are relevant for other academic disciplines at Boston College. Works about classical art and architecture are also of interest to and support the research of the Classics Department;  works about European art is of interest to and support the research of the Romance Language and Literatures and Germanic Studies Departments; works about art education are also of interest to and support the research of  the School of Education; other works in the collection are also of interest to and support the research of the Theology, Philosophy and Psychology Departments.   Many scholars share a research interest in the area of  medieval art and architecture.  Some Fine Arts courses are cross registered with the English, History, Communication and Irish Studies Departments.  

Formats and Types of Materials
The collection consists of monographs, reference works, serials, catalogues raisonnés, exhibition catalogues, indexes, CD-ROMs, films, and videotapes. Textbooks and "how to" books are generally not collected. In the area of architecture, the emphasis is the history of architecture and the works of individual architects as opposed to architectural techniques. The same holds true for photography, as very little is collected in the area of darkroom or photographic techniques. Historical treatments and general surveys in the area of decorative arts are included. The same policies and criteria apply to all electronic formats including digital images, electronic indexes and journals, bookmarks, and internet resources selected for the Bapst Library webpage.

Languages
English is the primary language of the collection, followed by works in French, Spanish, German, Italian, and Dutch.  

Geographic Areas (Subject Approach)
For the fine arts collection, Europe and the United States are the areas of primary interest. Asian and Islamic art will be given additional emphasis in the near future.  African, Latin American, Oceanic, and other traditions are represented by major surveys. There is a particular emphasis on the arts and architecture of Ireland.

Time Periods (Subject Approach)
The collection is concerned with the time period covered by the rise of civilization in the ancient Mediterranean world to the current day.

Date of Publication
Emphasis is on currently published materials.  Retrospective acquisiton is carried out to support new course offerings and to fill in the holdings of major serials; it will involve reprints or microforms if and only if original materials are no longer available.

Subject Areas and Level of Collection Intensity
BCAT, the online catalog, can be searched by LC classification number to get a better idea of what specific titles the fine arts collection contains.  For example, the command c=N5925 will produce the beginning of a list of works on Celtic art.  This list can be browsed by pressing the F8 key or typing f and pressing the Enter/Return key.