Visual Media Center
Department of Art, Art History & Visual Studies
The Visual Media Center of the Department of Art , Art History & Visual Studies maintains a continuously expanding collection of analog and digital images that primarily supports the daily teaching and ongoing research of the faculty and graduate students in the department, and secondarily the general teaching of visual culture by Duke University faculty. Works of art and architecture from prehistoric times to the present, from both Western and non-Western cultures, are represented.
The holdings currently number approximately 320,000 35mm slides, 40,000 photographs, 55,000 locally produced digital images, and 65,000 commercially licensed digital images. The collection contains images of traditional media such as architecture, drawing, painting, photography, prints, and sculpture; the many applied or decorative arts in glass, ivory, jewelry, metal, wood, etc.; newer media such as body art, computer art, digital art, performance art, video, etc.; and images of social, cultural, and historical documentation. Visual Media Collections@Duke is the digital image database for the Visual Resources Center’s digital collections. The University also subscribes to ARTstor and CAMIO through the University Libraries [link].
The use of materials in the Visual Media Center is subject to the copyright restrictions of the 1976 Copyright Act and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The VRC abides by the Fair Use provisions of the Copyright Act and also follows the Image Collection Guidelines produced by the Visual Resources Association. Materials borrowed by patrons are to be used for educational, non-profit use only.
The Visual Media Center has two staff members: Director John Taormina and Imaging Specialist/Web Manager Jack Edinger.
The Visual Media Center, in Rooms 107, 109, and 111 of East Duke Building, East Campus, is open to the campus community Monday-Friday, 8:30-4:30. Please contact the Director about other arrangements or with specific questions.
