Fine Arts/European Studies 56: Baroque Art
Fall 2005
GENERAL SOURCES | ENCYCLOPEDIAS, DICTIONARIES | INDEXES, BIBLIOGRAPHIES | INTERNET RESOURCES
General Sources
One of the best places to start research is in the
online Library
Catalogs. Connecting from Amherst puts you in the Four-College catalog
(which includes Amherst's holdings); there's a separate segment for UMass.
All books are listed by their AUTHORS, TITLES, and SUBJECTS, and you can
also search by KEYWORD.
For books about a particular artist, look up the artist's name (last
name first) as both AUTHOR and SUBJECT, for comprehensive retrieval.
KEYWORD searching is not likely to yield a complete list of locally-owned
books on any particular topic, but it's often a good way to start; you
can type in a common language characterization of your topic, say "baroque
painting", then, if you browse through the resulting list, select
titles relevant to your research interests, and note which official subject
headings are assigned, you can click on those and do a more thorough SUBJECT
search.
SUBJECT searching, as such, requires that you use the exact words
or phrases libraries have chosen to describe your topic. The official
SUBJECT for the above topic, for instance, is Painting, Baroque;
you might also enlarge it to Art, Baroque, or Arts, Baroque,
or narrow it with a geographical sub-division like Painting, Baroque--Italy.
Keep in mind that most major subject headings have detailed sub-divisions,
so browse through those as well. The five-volume Library of Congress
Subject Headings, near the Reference Desk, is a thesaurus of official
library terminology. Consult it if you're not sure of the official subject
vocabulary, or use the KEYWORD feature interactively, and/or ask for assistance
from a Reference Librarian.
To see if Amherst owns a journal, click on the JOURNAL TITLE option
in the menu screen of the Four-College Library Catalog, then type in the
journal's name.
For quick background information, try the
Britannica Online from any computer running Internet Explorer
or Netscape on the Amherst College campus.
Encyclopedias, Dictionaries
The Dictionary of Art. New York, Grove's Dictionaries,
1996. 34 volumes.
This basic encyclopedia includes entries on artists (short
biographies), topics, terms, etc. Many articles have brief bibliographies
appended. (Ref N 31 D5 1996) The
Dictionary of Art (click here to connect) is also available
online from any Amherst computer.
Encyclopedia of Comparative Iconography. Chicago,
Fitzroy Dearborn, 1998; 2 volumes.
An alphabetically-arranged set of essays on major
themes in art throughout the ages, with lists of selected artworks which
utilize each theme, and good bibliographies. (Ref N 7560 E53 1998)
Baroque Art: A Topical Dictionary. Westport CT, Greenwood,
1996.
Brief entries on themes and subject matter in European art
from the fourteenth through the sixteenth centuries. (Ref N 6415 B3 E18
1996)
The Encyclopedia of Sculpture. New York, Fitzroy
Dearborn, 2004; 3 volumes.
Basic biographical information on major and minor figures;
no bibliographies. (Ref N 6536 F5 1986)
Europe 1450 to 1789: Encyclopedia of the Early Modern
World. New York, Scribner's, 2004; 6 volumes.
Names, events, major topics; some entries with short bibliographies;
dealing with tendencies and developments in European history and culture.
(Ref D 209 E97 2004)
The Times Atlas of European History. New York, HarperCollins,
1994.
Maps enabling you to get a geographical fix on historical
events. (Ref G 1797.21 S1 T5 1994)
Chronology of World History. Santa Barbara, ABC-Clio,
1999; 4 volumes.
Year-by-year summary of events from prehistory to the near-present,
organized by date and then by categories like politics, technology, and
culture. (Ref D 11 M39 1999)
Indexes, Bibliographies
Art Books: A Basic Bibliography of Monographs...
. 2nd ed.; New York, Garland, 1997.
An authoritative one-volume list of the most important books
about artists, arranged alphabetically by artists’ last names. (Ref
Z 5938. F73 1997)
The American Historical Association's Guide to Historical
Literature. 3rd ed.; New York, Oxford, 1995.
A reliable listing of basic books in all areas of history,
arranged by period and place, with a substantial subject index at the
end of volume two. (Ref Z 6201 A55 1995)
Various computerized indexes to articles and books
(accessible by clicking on the links below) are likely to be crucial for
information-gathering for your research. In particular, the following
are recommended:: Art
Abstracts (for citations to articles published from 1984 to the
present) and Art
Index Retrospective (for items published between 1929 and 1983),
RILA/BHA (Repertoire International de la Litterature de l'Art/Bibliography
of the History of Art), the Avery
Index to Architectural Periodicals, Historical
Abstracts, and Academic
Search Premier.The last-named is a large, multi-disciplinary listing
with links to many full-text electronic versions of articles.
Please note that printed and computerized indexes and bibliographies
provide citations to journal articles which may or may not be owned by
the Amherst College Library.
When using electronic indexes (like Art Abstracts or Historical
Abstracts), a button labeled 'AC Links' now generates an automatic
search for electronic versions of articles you find cited; if the Library
does not have access to an electronic version, 'AC Links' will search
for a print-format version in the online Library Catalog.
To find out if and where we have a print-format backfile of a particular
journal, you can also look up each journal title (not article titles or
authors) in the online Library Catalog. Be attentive to volume numbers
and dates since sometimes we’ve started or stopped a subscription
in the middle of a run.
Internet Resources
The 'Research' button on the left side of the
Library Homepage provides reasonably
direct, organized access to Internet resources like library catalogs
in the U.S. and abroad, search engines for finding particular sites, and,
from the Art and
History
sub-sections, to discipline-specific meta-sites, image collections, etc.
Web searches using, say, Google, while they may lead you to interesting
sites, are not recommended as starting points for academic research. Not
only are your results likely to include large numbers of irrelevant hits
and so waste a lot of time, but many websites are insufficiently authoritative
or current. If you do feel inclined to browse the Web generally, at least
be skeptical of what you find; look for signs of authorship, educational
domain hosting, and dates in order to evaluate the usefulness of the information
mounted.
Do you have questions about research in this course? Contact Michael Kasper