LibGuides: Visual and Performing Arts: Images

Image Guides from Other Libraries

Internet Archive

A digital archive of the World Wide Web and other information on the Internet created by the Internet Archive, The service enables users to see archived versions of web pages across time, which the archive calls a "three dimensional index."

The intent is to capture and archive content that otherwise would be lost whenever a site is changed or closed down. The grand vision is to archive the entire Internet.

Online Collections

British Library
Over a million images, taken mostly from illustrations in 17th, 18th and 19th Century books, released into the public domain, as announced on the British Library blog. Metadata about the images, and the books from which they come, is also available for download on Github.
Digital Public Library of America
The Digital Public Library of America brings together the riches of America’s libraries, archives, and museums, and makes them freely available to the world. It strives to contain the full breadth of human expression, from the written word, to works of art and culture, to records of America’s heritage, to the efforts and data of science. DPLA aims to expand this crucial realm of openly available materials, and make those riches more easily discovered and more widely usable and used.
Getty Museum Open Content Images
Open content images are identified with a "Download" link. Images provided are JPEG files at a minimum of 300 ppi. Learn more about the Open Content Program here.
Google Arts and Culture
Discover exhibits and collections from museums and archives from across the world. Explore cultural treasures in extraordinary detail, from hidden gems to masterpieces.
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Locate license- and cost-free images that are in the public domain and free of other known restrictions for scholarly use in any media. Look for the OASC (Open Access for Scholarly Content) icon in the Collection section of the website. Learn more here.
Museum of Modern Art
MoMA’s evolving collection contains almost 200,000 works of modern and contemporary art by over 10,000 artists. 64,000 works are available online.
NASA Image and Video Library
Over 140,000 images, sounds, and video available and publicly searchable online. For more information, see NASA Media Usage Guidelines (https://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/guidelines/index.html).
National Gallery of Art
Open access digital images of works of art that the Gallery believes to be in the public domain. Images of these works are now available free of charge for any use, commercial or non-commercial. They are available for download at the NGA Images website. See Policy Details for specific instructions and notes for users.
New York Public Library -Digital Collections
This site is a living database with new materials added every day, featuring prints, photographs, maps, manuscripts, streaming video, and more.
Pixabay
480,000 public domain photos and cliparts released under Creative Commons CC0 - free for private and commercial use
Wikipedia: Public Domain Image Resources
A collection of public domain image collections.