The Carter’s research facilities include a library of over 150,000 items, archives with both institutional and private papers, and a Study Room where you can view artwork up close. In addition, provide access to significant holdings of primary source material and art research databases for a deeper dive into the history of American art.
The Reading Room is open to the public for quiet research and study. No appointment is necessary.
The Study Room is available to the public by appointment to view archival material, objects, and artwork not currently on display.
You can search the Museum's art collection for works in our collection, archival material including artists' archives, and some of our past exhibitions.
Our Artist Files are a great place to start research on individual artists. They're a treasure trove of unique materials including magazine articles, newspaper clippings, gallery invitations, and other unpublished items.
The Carter is host to the unrestricted microfilm of the Smithsonian Institution's Archives of American Art, a collection of over 20 million unpublished primary source documents that help tell the story of American art.
Our Archives include several Artists' archives, including thousands of pages of personal correspondence, scrapbooks, sketches, manuscripts, and objects like cameras that provide a unique insight into the artists' lives and work.
Our microform newspaper collection is a US-centric selection of 19th century newspapers, offering a record of the early history of the American West.
Other microform resources include collections like Texas as Province and Republic, 1795-1845, Western Americana: Frontier History of the Trans-Mississippi West, 1550-1900, and America, 1935-1946, a collection of around 87,000 Farm Security Administration and Office of War Information photographs of American life.
The Museum Archives include records about our building and history of the museum itself, collections of historical documents and photographs, as well as targeted research collections put together by experts in their fields.
Microform Newspaper Collection
AskART, Artnet, and other auction databases*
JSTOR*
*must be accessed on-site
