Departmental Libraries

Several curatorial departments have specialized library collections. All departmental library holdings appear in Watsonline, the Museum libraries’ online catalog.

The Cloisters Library and Archives

The Cloisters Library collects research material for the study of medieval art and related topics. The collection of approximately 15,000 volumes encompasses medieval architecture, painting, illuminated manuscripts, stained glass, sculpture, and decorative arts. Works on medieval history and gardens are also collected. The archives contain material relating to the history of the Museum, such as papers of James J. Rorimer, the Museum’s founding director, and George Grey Barnard, who amassed the core of its collection. Also held are the papers of medieval art historians Sumner McKnight Crosby and Harry Bober, art dealers Joseph and Ernest Brummer, and others.

The Met Cloisters is located in Fort Tryon Park. Its library is open to qualified researchers by appointment only. Requests for access to archival holdings should be sent via email and should include a brief summary of the research project and sources already consulted.

The Irene Lewisohn Costume Reference Library

The Costume Institute’s Irene Lewisohn Costume Reference Library collection contains over 30,000 books and nearly 700 periodical titles, as well as over 1,500 designer files all pertaining to the history of fashion and clothing from around the world, dating from the sixteenth century to today. Extensive special collections include artist books, exhibition history documentation, designer archives, fashion plates, lookbooks, photography collections, scrapbooks, sketches, textiles samples, and related fashion ephemera. Some special collections materials can be found on the Museum Libraries’ Digital Collections webpage.

The Robert Goldwater Library and The Visual Resource Archive

The Robert Goldwater Library is part of the Museum’s Michael C. Rockefeller Wing. It is a noncirculating research library dedicated to the documentation of the visual arts of sub-Saharan Africa, the Pacific Islands, and Native and Pre-Columbian America. The library collection comprises over 20,000 books published worldwide, with an additional 10,000 volumes of periodicals, including current subscriptions to nearly 100 journals. Recent issues of many of these serial titles are held in the Watson Library Periodicals Room.

Subject strengths include the art and material culture of West Africa, Papua New Guinea and Irian Jaya (Indonesia), and Pre-Columbian Mexico and Peru, with extensive holdings in related disciplines such as anthropology, ethnology, and archaeology. The library’s collection includes exhibition and auction sales catalogues, as well as academic theses and dissertations.

Joyce F. Menschel Photography Library

The Joyce F. Menschel Library contains more than 10,000 volumes relating to the history of photography and to the Museum’s collection of photographs. Located within the Department of Photographs, the library primarily serves the curatorial staff, but its collection is also accessible to outside researchers through the Thomas J. Watson Library.

The Onassis Library for Hellenic and Roman Art

The Onassis Library is a noncirculating research facility housing 17,000 volumes for the study of Greek and Roman Art. The collection specializes in early archaeological literature, exhibition and auction catalogues, sculpture, and vase painting—included are rare books, photographs, and extensive archival holdings.