I love finding free resources for entertainment and education and sharing them with others. For the art lovers out there, The Metropolitan Museum of Art has a premier collection of art books, available for free! That’s more than 400 titles available on demand in digital format. Some of these run more than $100 in printed format, so it’s quite deal to access them online for free. Titles include:
The Art of Precolumbian Gold: The Jan Mitchell Collection — Jones, Julie, ed. (1985). Amazon has this listed new and used from $15-$50.
Before Cortés: Sculpture of Middle America — Easby, Elizabeth Kennedy, and John F. Scott (1971). Amazon has this listed new and used from $3-$15.
The Colonial Andes: Tapestries and Silverwork, 1530–1830 — Phipps, Elena, Johanna Hecht, and Cristina Esteras Martín, with contributions by Thomas B. F. Cummins, Sabine MacCormack. Amazon has this listed new and used from $8-$13.
Mexico: Splendors of Thirty Centuries — Paz, Octavio (1990). Amazon has this listed new and used from $5-$20.
Zurbarán — Baticle, Jeannine, with essays by Yves Bottineau, Jonathan Brown, and Alfonso E. Pérez Sánchez (1988). Amazon has this listed new and used from $20-$34.
The Art Heritage of Puerto Rico: Pre-Columbian to Present — Museo del Barrio, The Metropolitan Museum of Art (1974). Amazon has this listed new at $52.
Access the entire collection online and find other titles to check out.
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NOTES
- Source: 400 Free Art Books That You Can’t Put Down | Lifehack
- Source: Download 422 Free Art Books from The Metropolitan Museum of Art | OpenCulture
- Source: MetPublications
Great idea to highlight these books (and thanks to the Met for access). I’d like to see bibliography of Houston (-ish) art books and biographies. Some project one day.