LibGuides: Art: Books and E-books

Books and e-books

To find e-books use Explore, the library catalogue.

The print books are located in the UCL Main Library and cover the areas of Fine Art, History of Art, art theory and criticism, film, performance, and photography as follows:

Section A: historiography, museums, curating and the art market
Section B: philosophy, aesthetics, criticism and cultural studies
Sections C - M: specific periods in art history, from pre-history to the 21st century
Section P: applied and performing arts, graphic design, costume, music and sound, theatre
Section Q: film studies, history of cinema
Section R: photography
Section T: techniques, colour, materials, conservation

The library catalogue is the principal tool to find books, journals and other materials (either in print or in electronic format) held in UCL libraries. In the catalogue, you will find the location details of the materials you are looking for: library site, collection and shelfmark.

Full text e-book collections

A&AePortal
Yale's A&AePortal is an eBook resource that features important works of scholarship in the history of art, architecture, decorative arts, photography, and design.
Berg Fashion Library
Provides access to interdisciplinary and integrated text and image content on world dress and fashion. It covers all regions of the world, with in-depth content from pre-history to the present day contributed by internationally-renowned scholars.
Bloomsbury Cultural History
Includes Bloomsbury’s Cultural Histories series, an extensive e-book collection, image partnerships with the Wellcome Collection and supporting features to support the study of culture throughout the ages from antiquity to modernity.
Bloomsbury Medieval Studies
With a global perspective this platform brings together high-quality secondary content with visual primary sources, a brand new reference work, and material culture images.
JSTOR
Archive of important scholarly journals but also includes many full text e-books on art historical topics.

Other relevant print collections

Ancient History: concentrates especially on Greek & Roman history of the early & classical periods, history of the Ancient Near East and the early Christian Church.
H istory: sections on medieval, early modern and modern history, with particular strengths in British, European, London, American and Latin American history.
English Language and Literature: books on literary topics not specific to any one language, literary theory and literature translated into English.
Philosophy: ancient and modern philosophy and aesthetics.

Anthropology: includes cultural and media studies.

The Bartlett Library: includes books and periodicals relating to architecture, planning, development planning, construction and project management, sustainable heritage, energy, sustainable resources and environmental design and engineering.

The Institute of Archaeology Library: collections of pre-Medieval art and archaeology and museum studies.

School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SSEES) library: includes books on the art and design of Central and Eastern Europe and Russia.

General reference works, encyclopeadias and dictionaries

Consult introductory material or general reference works for a broad overview of your issue or topic, and to identify key concepts, theories and researchers in the field.

These are some examples of introductory material available for Art History in the Library. The list is not extensive, and you should perform your own searches to see what else is available.

Oxford Art Online
Cross-search Grove Art Online, Oxford Companion to Western Art, Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, Benezit Dictionary of Artists, and Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms through one interface.
Oxford Bibliographies
UCL has access to the American Literature, Anthropology, Art History, Atlantic History, Biblical Studies, British and Irish Literature, Classics, International Relations, Islamic Studies, Latin American Studies, Linguistics, Medieval Studies, Political Science and Victorian Literature modules.

Finding e-books in Explore

A brief guide to finding and accessing e-books via UCL Explore.

Search Explore

Suggest a purchase

Suggest a purchase
Is there a book or resource you would like to see in our collection? Perhaps you've noticed something missing on your reading list? Please let us know by filling out our suggest a purchase form.

ReadingLists@UCL

ReadingLists @UCL is an online service that gives students easy access to materials on their reading lists wherever they are, and allows academic staff to create and update their own reading lists.

ReadingLists@UCL webpages

Theses

Theses
Information about: how to access copies of research theses that UCL Library Services holds, Open Access thesis depositories and how to deposit electronic theses.

Stores service

Stores service
The UCL Library off-site store is a closed access collection which houses important research material not currently in high demand. Users can request store material for delivery to various libraries.