The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD (Dutch: RKD-Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis), previously Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie (RKD), is located in

The Hague The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a city and municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's administrative centre and its seat of government, and while the official capital of ...

and is home to the largest

art history Art history is the study of aesthetic objects and visual expression in historical and stylistic context. Traditionally, the discipline of art history emphasized painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, ceramics and decorative arts; yet today ...

center in the world. The center specializes in documentation, archives, and books on

Western art The art of Europe, or Western art, encompasses the history of visual art in Europe. European prehistoric art started as mobile Upper Paleolithic rock and cave painting and petroglyph art and was characteristic of the period between the Paleol ...

from the late Middle Ages until modern times. All of this is open to the public, and much of it has been digitized and is available on their website. The main goal of the bureau is to collect, categorize, and make art research available, most notably in the field of

Dutch Masters Dutch Golden Age painting is the painting of the Dutch Golden Age, a period in Dutch history roughly spanning the 17th century, during and after the later part of the Eighty Years' War (1568–1648) for Dutch independence. The new Dutch Republ ...

. Via the available databases, the visitor can gain insight into archival evidence on the lives of many artists of past centuries. The library owns approximately 450,000 titles, of which ca. 150,000 are auction catalogs. There are ca. 3,000 magazines, of which 600 are currently running subscriptions. Though most of the text is in Dutch, the standard record format includes a link to library entries and images of known works, which include English as well as Dutch titles. The RKD also manages the Dutch version of the

Art and Architecture Thesaurus The Art & Architecture Thesaurus (AAT) is a controlled vocabulary used for describing items of art, architecture, and material culture. The AAT contains generic terms, such as "cathedral," but no proper names, such as "Cathedral of Notre Dame." Th ...

, a

thesaurus A thesaurus (plural ''thesauri'' or ''thesauruses'') or synonym dictionary is a reference work for finding synonyms and sometimes antonyms of words. They are often used by writers to help find the best word to express an idea: Synonym diction ...

of terms for management of information on art and architecture. The original version is an initiative of the

Getty Research Institute The Getty Research Institute (GRI), located at the Getty Center in Los Angeles, California, is "dedicated to furthering knowledge and advancing understanding of the visual arts".

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

History

The collection was started through bequests by

Frits Lugt Frederik Johannes "Frits" Lugt (Amsterdam 4 May 1884 – 15 July 1970 Paris), was a self-taught collector and connoisseur of Dutch drawings and prints and a selfless and tireless compiler of essential reference tools documenting Northern Europe ...

, art historian and owner of a massive collection of drawings and prints, and

Cornelis Hofstede de Groot Cornelis Hofstede de Groot (9 November 1863 – 14 April 1930), was a Dutch art collector, art historian and museum curator. Life He was born in Dwingeloo and spent some time in Switzerland in his youth due to weak lungs, where he learned German ...

(1863–1930), a collector, art historian and museum curator. Their bequest formed the basis for both the art collection and the library, which is now mostly housed in the Koninklijke Bibliotheek (National Library).

Open access website

Though not all of the library's holdings have been digitised, much of its

metadata Metadata is "data that provides information about other data", but not the content of the data, such as the text of a message or the image itself. There are many distinct types of metadata, including: * Descriptive metadata – the descriptive ...

is accessible online. The website itself is available in both a Dutch and an English user interface.

Online artist pages

In the artist database ''RKDartists'', each artist is assigned a record number. To reference an artist page directly, use the code listed at the bottom of the record, usually of the form: https://rkd.nl/en/explore/artists/ followed by the artist's record number. For example, the artist record number for

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (; ; ; 11 May 190423 January 1989) was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking and bizarr ...

is 19752, so his RKD artist page can be referenced.

Online artworks pages

In the images database ''RKDimages'', each artwork is assigned a record number. To reference an artwork page directly, use the code listed at the bottom of the record, usually of the form: https://rkd.nl/en/explore/images/ followed by the artwork's record number. For example, the artwork record number for ''

The Night Watch ''Militia Company of District II under the Command of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq'', also known as ''The Shooting Company of Frans Banning Cocq and Willem van Ruytenburch'', but commonly referred to as ''The Night Watch'' ( nl, De Nachtwacht), i ...

'' is 3063, so its RKD artwork page can be referenced.

Online thesaurus of art terms

The Art and Architecture Thesaurus also assigns a record for each term, but these can not be referenced online by record number. Rather, they are used in the databases and the databases can be searched for terms. For example, the painting called ''The Night Watch'' is a militia painting, and all records fitting this keyword (Dutch: ''algemene trefwoord'') can be seen by selecting this from the image screen. The thesaurus is a set of general terms, but the RKD also contains a database for an alternate form of describing artworks, that today is mostly filled with biblical references. This is the

iconclass Iconclass is a specialized library classification designed for art and iconography. It was originally conceived by Henri van de Waal, and was further developed by a group of scholars after his death. Development based on Dewey Decimal system The ...

database. To see all images that depict Miriam's dance, the associated iconclass code 71E1232 can be used as a special search term. All available records for iconclass code "71E1232"
in RKDimages

References

External links

* *
Direct link to the databases (artists, images, literature)The Dutch version of the ''Art and Architecture Thesaurus''
{{Authority control Art history Dutch culture Libraries in The Hague Open-access archives Photo archives in the Netherlands Buildings and structures in The Hague Education in South Holland