Arts Library

General Collections

The Arts Library has more than 270,000 books in the fields of architecture architectural history, art, art history, design, film, television, photography as art, and theater. Approximately one-third of these holdings are stored in the Southern Regional Library Facility. Most of the rest are housed in the open stacks of the Arts Library's main facility in 1400 Public Policy. Most open-stack materials circulate to readers with valid UCLA Library cards. The most important exceptions are reference works and current (unbound) periodicals. A small number of frequently requested items designated for permanent or specific class reserve is kept in closed stacks behind the Arts Library's Circulation Desk. These items may be requested at the Circulation Desk.

Art and Art History

The art collection at UCLA covers all aspects and periods of art and art history. It is strong in Italian Renaissance art, especially in Leonardo da Vinci materials (see the Elmer Belt Library of Vinciana), seventeenth century Dutch art, African Art, Pre-Columbian art, Asian art in Western languages (indigenous materials are housed in the East Asian Library in YRL), South Asian art, contemporary Latin American art, new media and contemporary art in general. Among its other strengths are museum studies, iconography, art theory, exhibition catalogs, and electronic resources. The library has an outstanding collection of artists' books which complements those in the Young Research Library Special Collections Department. The Visual Resources Collections at UCLA are located in the Art History and the Architecture departments respectively and are not part of the library.

Architecture

The Arts Library collection spans all areas of architectural history, theory, and practice. The UCLA Architectural Collection supports undergraduate and graduate students in the Department of Architecture, and undergraduate and graduate students in the Department of Art History. Focal points of the collection include contemporary European, Japanese, and Australian architecture, as well as twentieth-century Southern California and West Coast design.

Design

The UCLA Arts Library collects selectively in all areas of design and design history, including new media, industrial, graphic, typographic, furniture, glass, ceramics, fashion, textile, and jewelry. Within this broad subject, the Library supports faculty, graduates, and undergraduates in the Departments of Art, Art History, and Architecture and Design|Media Arts.

Film and Television

The UCLA Arts Library's collections in film and television encompass monographic works, reference works, periodicals and microforms on the history, criticism and theories of film and television, with particular strengths in American and European film and Third Cinema (cinemas of the developing world). The Arts Library also collects selectively works on the production (including pre-production and post-production) of film and television in support of the Film and Television Department production curriculum. Some materials in these subject areas are also housed in the Young Research Library (YRL), In addition, the Performing Arts Special Collections, contains archival paper collections related to film and television, with particular strengths in American film. These include studio collections and personal papers, as well as significant standalone collections of scripts, stills and promotional materials. Films and videos themselves are accessed through UCLA's Film and Television Archive or the Instructional Media Lab, and are generally not part of the Arts Library collections.

Theater

The Arts Library's collections in theater were designed primarily to support the Theater Department's production needs. Theater as a subject is both a form of literature (placing it within the Humanities) and a performing art (the Arts Library's purview). Thus these collections are split, with YRL collecting comprehensively in the history of world theater, theater theory and criticism, and plays. The Arts Library collects theater production (including materials on acting, set design, playwriting), collects a limited number of materials on the history, theories and criticism of Anglo-American theater production (in support of the recently revitalized theater doctoral program), maintains a selected plays collection for auditions and exercises, and serves as the central location for periodicals and reference materials in theater. In addition, Performing Arts Special Collections houses many archival collections related to theater. (It should be noted that there are also many theater-related collections in the Department of Special Collections.)

Special Collections

• Performing Arts Special Collections in 22478 Young Research Library; containing personal paper collections and historical records concentrated on the performing arts with particular emphases on Film,Television and Theater.
• The "Arts Cage" in 1400 Public Policy; a collection of rare, unusually valuable, or fragile books and periodicals in closed stacks. Materials from this collection must be paged at the Circulation Desk for reading in a special area and cannot be photocopied.
• The Elmer Belt Library of Vinciana in 1400 Public Policy, contains Leonardo and and associated materials. Materials from this collection must be paged at the Circulation Desk for reading in a special area. Antiquarian materials from the Belt Collection are housed in Special Collections at the Charles E. Young Reseach Library.