Subject Guide ~ Art and Art History

The resources listed below can be particularly helpful. The Art and Art History Departments generally follow guidelines from the Chicago Manual of Style. Ask your professor if he or she prefers a particular citation style, and consult the library's guide to citing sources for additional resources.

If you need more help, don't hesitate to ask a librarian.

Image Captions

• Images used in a research paper, slide presentation or website should include captions.
• Use parenthetical references in the research paper, placed at the end of a sentence.
  • example:  ... Painted in June, 1889, The Starry Night depicts the view from the east-facing window of his asylum room at Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, just before sunrise (fig 1).
• Titles of works of art are italicized.
• If an image is reproduced from a print source or a website, include the source's publication information.
• Caption elements include: Figure or Illustration number (i.e., Fig. or Ill.). Artist's name, Title of Work, Date, Medium, [Dimensions], Collection or Institution, Place.

image caption:
Fig. 1. Vincent Van Gogh, The Starry Night, 1889, Oil on canvas, 29 in. x 36 ¼ in., Museum of Modern Art, New York.

image downloaded from ARTstor
Fig 2. Frederic Edwin Church, Storm in the Mountains. 1847, Oil on canvas, Cleveland Museum of Art. ARTstor. http://www.artstor.org

image downloaded from a museum web site
Fig. 3. Claude Monet, Water Lilies. 1919, Oil on canvas, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/438008

image scanned from an image reproduced in a book
Fig 4. August Rodin, The Thinker, 1880-81. Bronze sculpture. Cleveland Museum of Art. Rodin: the Shape of Genius. By Ruth Butler. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993: 4.

RefWorks is a research and citation management service you can use to create bibliographies, format footnotes, and organize information that you import from the library's databases and other online sources. Footnotes and bibliographies created with RefWorks are only as good as the information you import. You will still need to edit some references. For help with that, refer to the library's guide to citing sources.

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