Contents:
Reference Sources
A. General Encyclopedias on the Renaissance
Grendler, Paul F., ed. Encyclopedia of the Renaissance.
New York: Scribner, 1999. REF CB361 .E52
Rundle, David, ed. Hutchinson Encyclopedia of the Renaissance.
Boulder, Col.: Westview Press, 1999. REF CB361 .H88
Wilson, Norman J., ed. European Renaissance and Reformation, 1350-1600.
Detroit: Gale Group, 2001. REF CB359 .E97
Bergin, Thomas Goddard, and Jennifer Speake. Encyclopedia of the Renaissance.
New York: Facts on File Publications, 1987. REF CB361 .B43
Avery, Catherin B., ed. New Century Italian Renaissance Encyclopedia.
New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1972. REF DG537.8 .A1 .N48
Carney, Jo Eldridge, ed. Renaissance and Reformation, 1500-1620: A Biographical Dictionary.
Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2001. REF CT759 .R46
Stearns, Peter N., ed. Encyclopedia of European Social History from 1350 to 2000.
New York: Scribner, 2001. REF HN373 .E63
B. Art Encyclopedias
Turner, Jane, ed. Dictionary of Art .
New York: Grove, 1996. REF N31 .D5
Encyclopedia of World Art.
New York: McGraw-Hill, 1959. REF N31. E533
Vinson, James, ed. International Dictionary of Art and Artists.
Chicago: St. James Press, 1990. REF N7425 .I67
C. Iconography and Mythology
Murray, Peter and Linda Murray. Oxford Companion to Christian Art and Architecture.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. REF N7830 .M87
Speake, Jennifer. Dent Dictionary of Symbols in Christian Art.
London: J.M. Dent, 1994. REF N7825 .S68
Ferguson, George Wells. Signs and Symbols in Christian Art.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1959. REF N8010 .F37
Hall, James. Dictionary of Subjects and Symbols in Art.
New York: Harper & Row, 1979. REF N7560 .H34
Carr-Gomm, Sarah. Dictionary of Symbols in Western Art.
New York: Facts on File, 1995. REF N7740 .C29
Reid, Jane Davidson. Oxford Guide to Classical Mythology in the Arts, 1300-1990s.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. REF NX650 .M9 R45
Bernen, Satia and Robert Bernen. Myth and Religion in European Painting, 1270-1700: The Stories as the Artists Knew Them.
New York: George Braziller, 1973. REF ND1288 . B47
Brumble, H. David. Classical Myths and Legends in the Middle Ages and Renaissance: A Dictionary of Allegorical Meanings.
Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1998. REF PN669 .B78
D. Indexes to Reproductions of Art in Books
Havlice, Patricia Pate. World Painting Index.
Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1977. REF ND45 .H38
Monro, Isabel Stevenson and Kate M. Monro. Index to Reproductions of European Paintings; A Guide to Pictures in More Than Three Hundred Books.
New York: Wilson, 1956. REF ND45 .M6
Clapp, Jane. Sculpture Index. Metuchen,
N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1970. REF NB36 .C55
Note that many reproductions are also available online. See Selected Web Sites below, or try Google’s image search: http://images.google.com/.
Videorecordings
These videos are located in the AV/ Music Room on the library’s main level. Videos can be checked out for three days. Viewing equipment is also available in the library.
Art of the Western World, Vol.’s 3-4 (Early & High Renaissance, 108″) N5300 .A77
The Day the Universe Changed, Vol. 3 (”Scientific Imagination in the Renaissance”, 50″) BD161 .D39
Uffizi, Florence’s Treasure House of Art: The Story of the Museum (60″) N6921 .F7 .U33
A Walk Around Florence (50″) DG732.4 .G84
The Agony and the Ecstasy (Michelangelo, 159″) PN1995.9 .H5 .A36
Saving the Sistine Chapel (60″) ND623 .M6558 .S38
The Vatican Museums (53″) N2940 .V345
Return to Glory: Michelangelo Revealed (Sistine Chapel, 52″) N8560 .R47
Yellow Gash: Jean-Paul Sartre on Tintoretto (65″) ND623 .T6 .V4
Raphael (174″) ND623 .R2 .R322
Donatello, 1386-1466 (60″) NB623 .D7 .D65
El Greco: Spirit of Toledo (60″) ND813 .T4 .E4
Finding Books Using the Library Catalog
Be aware that art books too large for the regular stacks are located in a special OVERSIZE section on the upper level. (LOLA will tell you if a book is oversize.)
AUTHOR search: Use this to find books by a particular author, or to find books containing reproductions of an artist’s work when you enter the artist’s name as an author.
WORD search: Use a keyword search: when a SUBJECT search is not successful; when you only need a few resources; or when you want to be particularly thorough in your search. Note that a WORD search will not find keywords in the subject headings.
SUBJECT search: This will find most of the library’s books about a given subject if you choose the right search term. You can use a particular artist, region/ place, or art technique, but you must use the “official” term drawn from the Library of Congress Subject Headings (the big red books near the reference desk). Here are some examples, with a rough guide to how many titles Lamson owns.
HOT TIP!: Many of the following links take you to a list of several subject headings. Instead of scanning each one individually, you can look at all the titles at once, in chronological order, by clicking the blue “Limit/Sort Search” button at the top of the page and then checking “Sort results by year.”
Finding Journal Articles
Academic Search Premier (electronic)
Provides indexing and partial full-text coverage for roughly 7,500 scholarly and popular publications covering all academic subjects. This database is the recommended starting point for most searches for journal articles.
Connect from the Library Home Page; from first screen, under “Quick Links”, click on “Journal Articles”; then click on Academic Search Premier. Use the “Subjects” button at top to verify subject terms.
This resource is also available off campus to PSU students, faculty, and staff; connect via the Plymouth portal: my.plymouth.edu - then go to the Library Home Page and follow the steps above.
Art Index (print & electronic)
A specialized print index covering all areas of art history and technique; provides citations to articles from over 400 art-related journals. Located in the Index Area between the Reference Collection and the Circulation Desk. Ask for assistance from a reference librarian if you are not finding enough journal references in Academic Search Premier.
Selected Web Sites
General Sites
Italian Renaissance Art Project
Art Cyclopedia
Mother of All Art and Art History Links Pages
Virtual Art Museum
Prof. Chris Witcombe’s Art History Resources on the Web
Metropolitan Museum of Art Timeline of Art History
Online Guides to Writing Art History Papers
Writing the Art History Paper (Dartmouth College)
Art History Writing Guide (Wesleyan University)
Writing in Art History (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
Also, don’t forget Lamson Library’s guide to citing sources (MLA, APA, etc.), listed under Style Guides on our homepage.
Renaissance Art in Boston’s Museums
If you’re interested in seeing more than reproductions, original works of Renaissance art can be found at the following Boston-area art museums. Be sure to call and ask about hours, guided tours, and the possibility of free admission times.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Designed in the style of a 15th-century Venetian palace, this museum combines architecture, paintings, sculpture, decorative arts, music concerts, and the color and fragrance of a flowering interior courtyard to create a unique atmosphere for experiencing one of the country’s great Renaissance art collections. It is particularly rich in Italian paintings, including masterpieces by Botticelli (Madonna with the Eucharist), Raphael, Titian (Rape of Europa), Giotto, and Simone Martini, among others. Admission: $5 with your student ID.
Between October 8 and January 11 the museum will be hosting a special exhibit, “Raphael, Cellini, and a Renaissance Banker: The Patronage of Bindo Altoviti.” One of the most powerful bankers of the Renaissance, Bindo Altoviti (b. 1491) developed close ties with artists in both Rome and Florence. Raphael and Cellini made dynamic and very different portraits of Altoviti, and these two works (from the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Gardner Museum) will be brought together for the first time in more than two hundred years. Works of art borrowed from collections in Europe and the United States will complete the picture of Altoviti’s collection and aid in understanding the role of patronage in the High Renaissance. There will be an all-day symposium on November 8.
Fogg Art Museum
The oldest art museum at Harvard University, the Fogg Art Museum covers the history of Western art from the Middle Ages on. It owns more than 450 Italian Renaissance paintings, and is particularly strong in works of the early Renaissance (Lorenzetti, Aretino, Gaddi, Fra Angelico, etc.) Its galleries are distributed around a Renaissance courtyard, based on a sixteenth-century facade in Montepulciano, Italy. Admission: $5.
Museum of Fine Arts
The MFA is one of the world’s major art museums. Several galleries are devoted to Renaissance art. Decorative arts and sculpture are particularly well represented, including Donatello’s Madonna of the Clouds marble relief, an extremely rare example of the artist’s sculpture in the United States. Admission: $13 for 2 visits within 30 days, with college ID.
McMullen Museum
Boston College’s art museum contains works that span the history of art. It has an excellent collection of Italian paintings from the 16th and 17th centuries. Admission: Free.
Compiled by Cab Vinton, October 30, 2003
