Library Resources

Overview

Most Stanford Campus ID Card holders can use their cards to access the Stanford Libraries and borrow library materials. Borrowing privileges are automatically activated the day after the ID is issued. For same-day privileges, please visit the Privileges Office at Green Library.

Your privileges allow you to borrow materials as well as place materials on reserve. Loan periods vary depending on the type of material borrowed and the loan policies of the library from which the material is borrowed. See the Stanford Libraries’ website for more information.

The Bowes Art & Architecture Library

Located on the second floor of the McMurtry Building, the Bowes Library supports art-related research, teaching, exploration, and discovery. The Library collects titles in the fields of art, architecture, and design. Holdings range in coverage from Paleolithic to the present and are particularly strong in the areas of medieval, Renaissance, modern, contemporary, and Chinese art history. Art Locked Stacks includes rare and unique materials such as twentieth-century ephemera, photobooks, rare periodicals, and artists’ books.

The Bowes Library is your closest branch of the Stanford Libraries system. Print and digital holdings are accessible via the online catalog SearchWorks. Stanford Libraries’ vast collections include access to periodicals and newspapers in print and online, ebooks, digital collections, and databases of articles, reference works, images, audio and video recordings. Stanford Libraries’ Special Collections also has many art-related holdings including photography collections, rare books, and artists’ archives.

Class Visits

Please contact Lindsay King (lindsay.king [at] stanford.edu (lindsay[dot]king[at]stanford[dot]edu)) or Katie Keller (kkeller [at] stanford.edu (kkeller[at]stanford[dot]edu)) about bringing your class to Bowes Library for a librarian-guided session on how to do research and/or a viewing of Art Locked Stacks materials.

Course Reserves

Requests can be made either via webform, or by contacting the Bowes Library’s Head of Reserves, Lorna Corbetta (corbetta [at] stanford.edu (corbetta[at]stanford[dot]edu)).

Accessing Digital Images

The Art & Architecture Library’s Visual Resources Center (VRC) hosts the ImageBase which contains approximately 250,000 digital images. Log into imagebase.stanford.edu using your SUNet ID.

Stanford Libraries also subscribes to Artstor Digital Library, now part of JSTOR, one of thousands of subscription databases available through SearchWorks. For authentication from off-campus, be sure to use the links in SearchWorks.

PLEASE NOTE: ImageBase is for educational and scholarly use only. For more information, please see Stanford's Fair Use site. If you have questions about image use, please contact the VRC.

Web Course Study Sets

The VRC can create digital course study sets (images only) that correspond to your lectures and/or exams. These are created from existing ImageBase files and new digital photography.

Requests for course study sets should be arranged with VRC staff weeks in advance. Please email VRC staff at vrcstaffers [at] lists.stanford.edu (vrcstaffers[at]lists[dot]stanford[dot]edu) for deadlines and production details.