🎨DP Visual Arts

Citing Sources

Citing an artwork

When writing an essay in Visual Arts, you will need to include more detail about the art work you are citing than you would for sources in other subjects.

• artists's name

• title of the artwork

• date of the artwork

• medium of composition

• institution it is housed in (e.g. the name of the gallery or museum), and city if visited in person.

• Optional: the dimensions of the work if relevant.

If the image is reproduced on a website or a book you should treat this as the MLA container and include this information in your reference too.

For a Visual Arts Extended Essay, full references for images used can be included in a separate list (in MLA format) after your works cited list. This list of references should be called "Illustrations".

Basic format

For Caption:

Artist First Name + Lastname (not reversed). Title of work, date of composition, medium, size.

For works cited list:

Artist Lastname, First Name. Name of Work. Original year of composition, medium, size. Holding institution (gallery or museum), URL. Access Date.

Note that information about the original year of composition, medium and size is included as an MLA supplmental element.

Citing an artwork from a gallery or museum website

Note that the reference below has three supplemental elements added after the title of the art work: the date of composition, the medium, and the dimensions.

Fig. 1. Piet Mondrian. Lozenge Composition with Yellow, Black, Blue, Red, and Gray. 1921, oil on canvas, 60 x 60 cm.

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Works Cited

Mondrian, Piet. Lozenge Composition with Yellow, Black, Blue, Red, and Gray. 1921, oil on canvas, 60 x 60 cm. The Art Institute of Chicago, www.artic.edu/artworks/109819/lozenge-composition-with-yellow-black-blue-red-and-gray. Accessed 20 Aug. 2022.

Citing an artwork from a gallery or museum website

This is a public domain image from The Met's Open Access Collection.

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Fig. 3. Paul Cézanne. Mont Sainte-Victoire, Circa 1902-6, oil on canvas, 57.2 x 97.2 cm.

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Works Cited

Cézanne, Paul. Mont Sainte-Victoire. Circa 1902-6, oil on canvas, 57.2 x 97.2 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/435878. Accessed 20 Apr. 2022.

A work you have created yourself

Fig. 2. Plagiarism. 2022, Digital (created by author).

Citing a sculpture from a gallery or museum website

Fig. 4. Fitting in the form of a quadruped with interlace, 5th century BCE, Late Eastern Zhou dynasty, Warring States period, bronze.

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Works Cited

Fitting in the form of a quadruped with interlace. 5th century BCE, Late Eastern Zhou dynasty, Warring States period, bronze, 11.8 x 20.4 cm. The Smithsonian Institution, www.si.edu/object/fitting-form-quadruped-interlace:fsg_F1948.24. Accessed 12 Aug. 2022.

Viewed in a book

Warhol, Andy. Do-It-Yourself (Flowers). 1962, acryclic and silkscreen on canvas, 175 x 150 cm, Collection of Thomas Ammann, Zurich. Warhol, by Klaus Honnef, Taschen, 2000, p. 56.

Viewed firsthand

Castigolione, Guiseppe. The Qianlong Emperor Enjoying the Lunar New Year. Circa 1736–38, The Palace Museum, Hong Kong. Hanging scroll, ink and colour on silk.

Note that here only the medium and size (though in this case the size is not given) are put in a supplemental element at the end of the reference.

Research

Research databases

• JSTOR Art & Art History
• Art & Architecture Source via HKPL

  Art & Architecture Source includes Art in America (11/01/2002 to present).

Galleries & Museums with Digital Collections

• Google Street Art
• MoMA
• The Guggenheim
• Whitney Museum of American Art
• The Tate
• Google Arts and Culture

Public Domain (CC0) and Open Access images

• The Met Open Access
• National Gallery of Art Open Access
• Rijksmuseum Rijksstudio
• Smithsonian Open Accces

Other Links

• NYT Arts Page
• Visual Arts EE Subject Guidance