Library: OER: Art &amp; Design

Open Textbooks

Art
Art History

Introduction to Art: Design, Context, and Meaning Introduction to Art: Design, Context, and Meaning offers a comprehensive introduction to the world of Art. Authored by four USG faculty members with advance degrees in the arts, this textbooks offers up-to-date original scholarship. It includes over 400 high-quality images illustrating the history of art, its technical applications, and its many uses.
Graphic Design and Print Production Fundamentals This textbook - written by a group of select experts with a focus on different aspects of the design process, from creation to production - addresses the many steps of creating and then producing physical, printed, or other imaged products that people interact with on a daily basis. It covers the concept that, while most modern graphic design is created on computers using design software, the ideas and concepts don't stay on the computer. The ideas need to be completed in the computer software, then progress to an imaging (traditionally referred to as printing) process. Keywords are highlighted throughout and summarized in a Glossary at the end of the book, and each chapter includes exercises and suggested readings.
Digital Foundations Authors' Note: This book was written by two artist educators who teach digital art and design studio foundation classes. While teaching classes that take place in software laboratories, we noticed that many of our students expected to learn to use software, but gave little consideration to aesthetics or art and design history. A typical first day question is, "Are we going to learn Photoshop in this class?" At first we were tempted to oblige our students' thirst for so-called practical knowledge, but we recognize that in the absence of the visual, theoretical, and historical frameworks, practical knowledge is practically useless. To teach our classes, we used the very best of the software training manuals, and supplemented them with all the visual and historical material that was missing. After settling for years on books that don't really encapsulate a class, we finally decided to write the book that we think all introductory media design students should be using. For us, a student is anyone actively engaged in learning. A student can be working towards a degree in art, communication, graphic design, illustration, and so on in a traditional classroom setting, or a self-taught found-it-on-the-bookstore-shelf learner. In the twenty chapters that follow, we have shared small bites of history, followed by visual references, and then digital exercises that explore creative software in a manner that brings design principles into the software demo. Originally, this book was printed as a manual to the Adobe Creative Suite, the software found in classrooms and labs around the country. Just a month after the book was published, we teamed up with Floss Manuals to convert our manuscript into one that teaches the same design principles using open source software.

Art History (WikiBooks) Covers prehistoric, ancient, medieval, Renaissance art as well as 18th, 19th, and 20th Century art. Includes glossary of terms and movements.
The Bright Continent: African Art History This book aims to act as your map through the world of African art. As such, it will help you define the competencies you need to develop–visual analysis, research, noting what information is critical, asking questions, and writing down your observations–and provide opportunities for you to practice these skills until you are proficient. It will also expose you to new art forms and the worlds that produced them, enriching your understanding and appreciation.
Smarthistory books Provides access to a collection of art history textbooks each focusing on specific time periods and/or places.
Western Art from 18th to Mid-20th Century Historical developments in Western art from 18th century to the mid-20th century. Focused on European and American art.

Open Access Journals

Artifact: Journal of Design Practice Since its first publication in 2007, Artifact has focused on practice-based design research and aims to explore conditions, issues and tasks pertaining to design development in a broad sense. As an international design research journal, Artifact targets the global design research community with the aim of strengthening knowledge sharing and theory building of relevance to design practice. All articles and research notes are subject to double-blind peer-review.
International Journal of Creative Media Research An interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed and open access academic journal devoted to pushing forward the approaches to and possibilities for publishing creative media-based research. Championing critical rigor and creative reflection, the International Journal of Creative Media Research specializes in capturing the emerging tools, approaches and methods of practice-based and practice-led research. The journal publishes original screen-based, sound-based, time-based and experiential forms of creative media research, spanning works of film, music, media art, creative and digital writing, curation practice, multi-platform and ludic artefacts that contribute to fields across Media and Game Studies, Communication and Cultural Studies, Art and Design, Music, Creative Writing, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies, or Education.
Journal of Science and Technology of the Arts A peer-reviewed publication that results from a commitment of the Research Center for Science and Technology of the Arts (CITAR) to promote knowledge, research and artworks in the field of the Arts. The Journal provides a distinctive forum for anyone interested in artistic research and practised-based research. JSTA publishes three issues annually (April, July, and December) by the Universidade Católica Portuguesa, under an open access policy and has no article submission charges or article processing charges. JSTA is indexed by Scopus.
MaHKUscript. Journal of Fine Arts Research MaHKUscript. Journal of Fine Art Research is a peer-reviewed international platform for artists, curators, theorists, research students and educators who consciously integrate research in their working practice. MaHKUscript focuses on the situation and position of research in the current Fine Art domain. Starting from the specificity of Fine Art practice it investigates the meaning of research for art, education, dissemination and the development of topical curatorial strategies.

Arts Arts (ISSN 2076-0752) is a peer-reviewed, open access scholarly journal that publishes new, significant research on all aspects of the visual and performing arts. Its goal is to promote critical inquiry, dialogue, and innovative approaches. We welcome articles that present innovative and important scholarship—theoretical, historical, interdisciplinary, and global—as well as other contributions of broad scholarly interest such as interviews with leading artists.
British Art Studies British Art Studies provides an innovative space for new peer-reviewed scholarship on all aspects of British art, architecture, and visual culture in their most diverse and international contexts. It is co-published by the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, London, and the Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, and reflects their dynamic research cultures. One of the few completely open access journals in the field of art history, British Art Studies is also a forum for the growing debates about digital humanities, publication, and copyright.
Conservation Science in Cultural Heritage Main topics of publication: Historical-artistic knowledge of cultural heritage (i.e. author, art movement, period of realization, techniques, society and cultural characteristics, socio-economic context, commissioning, financing, interested public); History, diagnosis, restoration, maintenance, conservation, valorization, prevention; Book, codex, and manuscript production in its historical context; Appropriate methodologies and analytical techniques used for the characterization of historical artifacts and evaluation of the conservation state; etc.
Contemporaneity: Historical Presence in Visual Culture Contemporaneity is an open access and peer-reviewed journal that publishes scholarly and artistic explorations of the diverse ways in which the complexities of being in time are expressed. It is based in the department of the History of Art & Architecture at the University of Pittsburgh, and emerges from its innovative constellations program. We publish question-driven research that resonates across disciplines, interrogating diverse visual material from across time using multiple methods.
Journal for Art Market Studies The Journal for Art Market Studies is a peer-reviewed open-access journal for current international academic research on the art market of all periods. The articles are published in English. The Journal for Art Market Studies typically adopts a double blind peer review process by two referees for submissions. Reviewers are selected by the editorial team on the basis of their research subjects and are kindly requested to complete their reports within three weeks.
Journal of Art Historiography The Journal of Art Historiography, an open-access peer-reviewed e-journal, is dedicated to the self-critical exploration of art history as a methodological practice. The journal’s commitment to inclusivity results in remarkable breadth of coverage, with each issue collating commissioned articles, conference papers, book reviews, and primary research materials (including translations of influential texts). Its cross-disciplinary emphasis makes this journal of great interest not only to the art historian, but to sociologists, archaeologists, anthropologists, ethnographers and scholars of many other disciplines.
Studies in Digital Heritage Studies in Digital Heritage (SDH) is a peer-reviewed academic journal established by the Office of Scholarly Publishing (OSP) and the Virtual World Heritage Lab at Indiana University. The mission of SDH is to promote the open exchange of information and knowledge among researchers, practitioners, policy makers, and others who strive to improve the collection, use, management, preservation and dissemination of Digitized Cultural Heritage. The vision of SDH is to be the premier forum where the scientific discussion among scholars can be developed, touching the entire gamut of Digital Heritage. SDH publishes peer-reviewed research articles and occasionally non-peer reviewed materials (e.g. interviews, editorials) with biannual frequency.

Review of Artistic Education The Journal is intended as an opportunity for interdisciplinary and intercultural approach opened to pedagogical, psychological, sociological and political analyses in the field of intercultural and artistic education. There are few journals that address this area of research.

Online Courses

Art History

Art Appreciation @ East Tennessee State University

The Art Appreciation course explores the world’s visual arts, focusing on the development of visual awareness, assessment, and appreciation by examining a variety of styles from various periods and cultures while emphasizing the development of a common visual language. The materials are meant to foster a broader understanding of the role of visual art in human culture and experience from the prehistoric through the contemporary.

Course Resources

Art Cyclopedia
Fine Arts search engine database: 9,000 artists listed, 2,900 art sites indexed, and 160,000 links.
Method of Action
Method of Action creates tools, toys, and games to help you learn design, for free.

Archives of American Art
Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institute, is an excellent image collection containing over 8,000 photographs, sketches, letters, and other documents that have been scanned and individually described.
The Art History Archive
The Art History Archive is an Educational Database Library (EDL) providing educators and students with more comprehensive information about artistic movements, art groups, and specific artists.
The Art Story
The most informative, accurate, and user-friendly websites for the study of art history, with a primary focus on Modern Art. However, this resource covers artists and movements that reach far beyond the context of Modern Art. The background information, images, and artist pages are presented in a way that has the potential to engage both a seasoned art history professor, as well as 3rd grade student.
Smarthistory
Provides overview histories of each period of art as well as courses, guides, and e-books.

Art & Education
Art & Education is a publishing platform from e-flux and Artforum focusing on education and contemporary art. Since 2004, it has been a singular resource for information about the most important exhibitions, programs, and events in education worldwide.
Art Education Commons
The Digital Commons Network provides free access to full-text scholarly articles and other research from hundreds of universities and colleges worldwide. Curated by university librarians and their supporting institutions, this dynamic research tool includes peer-reviewed journal articles, book chapters, dissertations, working papers, conference proceedings, and other original scholarly work. This particular site features Art Education topics.
MERLOT and Art Education
This is a preview of some great MERLOT materials in the area of art education.
Met Museum Lesson Plans
These k-12 lesson plans help you integrate learning about works of art in your classroom. Select an option below to browse lesson plans by grade, or continue scrolling to see all lesson plans.
National Art Education Association (NAEA)
Founded in 1947, The National Art Education Association is the leading professional membership organization exclusively for visual arts educators. Members include elementary, middle and high school visual arts educators, college and university professors, researchers and scholars, teaching artists, administrators and supervisors, and art museum educators, as well as more than 45,000 students who are members of the National Art Honor Society or are university students preparing to be art educators.
National Gallery of Art Lesson Plans
Organized into thematic units, this valuable resource contains grade-level-specific lesson plans. There are lesson plans and resources for Pre-K, K-12, and College/University students. These lessons meet National Art Education Association (NAEA) Visual Arts curriculum standards.
Smithsonian American Art Museum Education Resources
Discover the many online education resources and virtual programs available for teachers, students, and life-long learners of all ages from the Smithsonian American Art Museum

Asian Art Museum
Our mission is to lead a diverse global audience in discovering the unique material, aesthetic, and intellectual achievements of Asian art and culture. Strategically located on the Pacific Rim and serving one of the most diverse communities in the United States, the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco – Chong-Moon Lee Center for Asian Art and Culture is uniquely positioned to lead a diverse, global audience in discovering the distinctive materials, aesthetics and intellectual achievements of Asian art and cultures, and to serve as a bridge of understanding between Asia and the United States and between the diverse cultures of Asia.
Google Cultural Institute: Google Art Project [Open Culture]
The Google Cultural Institute: Google Art Project is a collaborative partnership with several world acclaimed art museums (representing 40+ countries) to display a gallery collection of (40,000+ high resolution) artworks by various artists sorted by historical time periods/movements, location, and more. Here the viewer can easily select an artwork to zoom in and out to enlarge the size and detail. Also, you can select and put two art work selections side-by side for making comparisons/contrasts in their artistic style, medium, theme, genre, subject matter, and more. In addition, Google's "Windows View Project" allows you to view an impressive selection of cultural landmarks and world heritage sites. This is an excellent site for Art History teachers and students.
National Gallery of Art - Open Access Images
NGA Images is a repository of more than 45,000 open access, digital images of the collections of the National Gallery of Art. On this website you can search, browse, share, and download images.The images are free of charge for download and use.