Art and Design

Original drawings by American book, magazine, and newspaper illustrators,1880-1910.

Engravings, illustrations, woodcuts, lithographs, fine photogravures, and photographic prints in books published between 1840 and 1970.

Artists living and working in Japan created these fine art prints.

Drawings from 1750 to 1970. Includes eye-witness sketches from the US Civil War plus topographical views, bank note vignettes, portraits, and courtroom sketches. Russian drawings show areas of China in the 1800s.

Drawings by American artist, illustrator, and printmaker Joseph Pennell (1857-1926).

Prints created as art works, ca. 1450-present. American printmakers and artists (e.g., Paul Revere, Mary Cassatt, Jim Dine, Joseph Pennell) predominate.

Woodblock prints and drawings by Japanese artists of the 17^th through early 20^th centuries.

Paintings, cartoon illustrations, and photographs showing working people, American industry, and political situations. Art work by social realists, women, African Americans, and Mexicans is well represented.

The work of Ilka [Irène] Kolsky (1909–1938).

Design sketches for stained glass windows, murals, mosaics, furnishings, metalwork, and interior architecture. The drawings feature striking watercolors created from the 1860s to the 1990s, primarily for churches, synagogues, and other sacred spaces.

Photographs, sound recordings, and field notes documenting Hispanic art and artists.

Manuscripts, lithographic books and early imprints, plus printed books in Persian.

Views of Europe, the Middle East, and North America, 1890s through the 1910s. Created by the Photoglob Company in Zürich, Switzerland, and the Detroit Publishing Company in Michigan.The richly colored images look like photographs but are actually ink-based photolithographs.

About 15,000 historical prints (ca. 1700-1900) created to document geographic locations or popular subjects and sometimes used for advertising and educational purposes.

Hundreds of photographs, maps, and books highlighting the contributions of African-Americans; originally curated by W.E.B. Du Bois and Thomas J. Calloway.

The photographic files of an early American news picture agency. Documents sports events, theater, celebrities, crime, strikes, disasters, political activities including the women's suffrage campaign, conventions and public celebrations.

Views and portraits made during the Civil War (1861-1865) and its immediate aftermath. Original glass plate negatives made under the supervision of Mathew Brady and Alexander Gardner.

Most images are portraits, but includes some early architectural views, outdoor scenes, and copies of works of art. Many images here are credited to Mathew Brady's studio.

Glass negatives and transparencies plus color photolithograph prints, mostly of the eastern United States. Subjects include city streets, architecture, parks, gardens, recreation, and work scenes.

Black and white negatives, transparencies, lantern slides, and color autochromes by Arnold Genthe (1869-1942).

African Americans in military and social history, from the Civil War through 1945.

Glass and film negatives taken by Harris & Ewing, Inc., which show people, events, and architecture in Washington, DC between 1905 and 1945.

The work of Frances Benjamin Johnston (1864-1952).

Albumen silver half stereographs published by Lawrence and Houseworth of San Francisco between 1862 and 1867. The photographs depict major settlements, boom towns, placer and hydraulic mining operations, and shipping/transportation routes. Includes a pictorial survey of mid-19^th-century San Francisco.

Portrait photographs (ambrotypes and tintypes) and small card photos (cartes de visite) represent both Union and Confederate soldiers during the American Civil War (1861-1865). The portraits often show weapons, hats, canteens, musical instruments, painted backdrops, and other details.

Glass and film photographic negatives created by the American Colony Photo Dept. and its successor firm, the Matson Photo Service. Most images depict Palestine (present day Israel and the West Bank) from 1898 to 1946.

The work of Lewis Hine (1874-1940), who documented working and living conditions of children in the United States between 1908 and 1924.

Documents virtually all aspects of Washington, DC, life during the administrations of Presidents Wilson, Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover.

American cityscapes, landscapes, and group portraits. The images date from 1851 to 1991 and depict scenes in all fifty states and the District of Columbia.

Photographic prints that have a special aesthetic, technical, or historic importance.

Color photographs by Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky (1863-1944) showing the Russian Empire between ca. 1905 and 1915. Subjects include people, religious architecture, historic sites, agriculture, public works construction, water/railway transportation routes, and views of villages and cities.

Cities and towns around the world, expeditions and expositions, industries, disasters, and portraits of Native Americans, presidents, and celebrities (1870-1920).

Since 1990, this Library of Congress-curated archive has collected and digitized millions of historically important documents. Everything from photos to audio recordings can be found here.

Donated by Carl Sandburg in 1954, the Benjamin K. Edwards collection consists of 2,100 cards from 1887-1914.

The work of Pulitzer Prize-winning Herbert L. Block (Herblock), commentator and cartoonist.

The story of America through its newspapers, digitized and searchable.

23 examples of early animation, including the Katzenjammer Kids and Krazy Kat.

Includes everything from Barnum & Bailey lithographs to Captain Beefheart concert posters.

From the late 19^th-early 20^th century, over 2,000 pieces including burlesque, vaudeville, minstrel shows, and Harry Houdini.

120 posters made between 1936-1939, representing all sides of the conflict.

Approximately 1,900 pieces from 1914-1920.

Over 900 promotional and activity posters from FDR’s Work Projects Administration.

Over 3,000 political posters collected between 1927-1980.