Proquest: Art, Design and Architecture

Series: Our favourite State Library eResources

People often ask us what our most loved eresources are. Admittedly we all have a favourite, or two, or three. It’s hard to pick as there are so many wonderful State Library eresources available. In this series our Librarians and Library Technicians share with you their most favourite eresources and how they’ve been used to solve research queries. 

Next in the series we look at Proquest Art Design and Architecture Database, a big favourite of Librarian Christina Ealing-Godbold.

So why is Proquest Art Design and Architecture so fabulous?

Photography, ceramics, industrial design and architecture – all these topics are covered by the Proquest Art Design and Architecture database, with an amazing array of journals at your fingertips

Best of all, you can access Proquest Art Design and Architecture online from home with your free State Library membership.

Search across key art and design resources

This collection Proquest Art Design and Architecture includes the following specialist subsets:

• ARTbibliographies Modern (modern and contemporary art)
• Design and Applied Arts Index (for all aspects of design and crafts)
• International Bibliography of Art (western art history)
• Arts and Humanities Full Text (current full-text journals)

Staying abreast of discoveries and research in art history and decorative arts is a challenge. Proquest Art Design and Architecture is a great source for this topic area.

Silver Overlay work, for example, a twentieth century technology applied to glass and ceramics is well documented in an array of different sources. This topic can easily be searched in art history magazines, decorative arts books, antique and collectables works and even in design journals. All can be searched at once by using the Proquest Art Design and Architecture database.

The date range for the magazines covered is from 1973 to the present. 

Some search tips

Search for a phrase in quotation marks to maximise your success e.g. “silver overlay”.

The Advanced Search option allows the researcher to select specific kinds of publications as well as works in a range of languages. In the arts field, the ideal article may well be in Spanish or French and maybe in a specialist newsletter. This database includes more than academic peer reviewed journals – it includes many different kinds of publications that may just give you that link to information that is not evident in the academic field.

Coverage of Australian and Queensland content and beyond

There is Australian and Queensland information contained in the database. From published books to journals like

• Art and Australia Journal
• Australia and New Zealand Journal of Art
• Art Monthly Australia

However, the database is ideal for researching broader trends and topics in the art and design fields.  This selection of material provides an ideal complimentary resource for those interested in understanding the background and innovation in art and design subjects and is a perfect accompanying source for those interested in the history of antiques and decorative art movements across the international stage.

Architecture is well served by 95 Architectural journals, including trade journals, covering the built environment from Seattle to Bognor Regis, from Los Angeles to Bogota, Minneapolis to Shanghai and Oslo and beyond.  A broad array to topics includes building energy research, the use of glass in modern buildings, green spaces and places, effective lighting strategies in design and project management in architecture. 

For the art history field, the database is ideal for an up to date search on trends across all continents and countries and includes well known peer reviewed journals as well as those with a trade or specific audience. The navigation bar allows searching within specific publications and journals to enable the searcher to narrow the broad searching strategy, if required.

Join now and start searching Proquest Art Design and Architecture.

Look out for the next blog in this series #FavouriteEresources