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Image Resources
Explore this guide to find images relating to the culture, history, and geography of Los Angeles and Southern California.
Day of the Dead '80 Exhibition, via Calisphere
- California Historical Society This collection represents the environmental, economic, social, political, and cultural heritage of the entire state, including materials from outside California that contribute to a greater understanding of the state and its people. Includes over 500,000 photographs.
- California State Library Picture Catalog (Note the drop down menu option to limit your catalog search to images)
- Calisphere This link opens in a new window Over one million photographs, documents, letters, artwork, diaries, oral histories, films, advertisements, musical recordings, and more from the collections digitized and contributed by all ten campuses of the University of California and other important libraries, archives, and museums throughout the state.
- Calisphere: Lee (S. Charles) Papers Drawings, renderings, blueprints, photographs, and surveys relating to the professional career of architect S. Charles Lee. Most of the collection reflects his work as a developer and the most prolific architect of art deco movie palaces in Los Angeles.
- Calisphere: UCLA Historic Photographs The UCLA Historic Photographs collection is drawn from many collections held in the UCLA University Archives. Many photographs in this collection are drawn from the photographs taken by Thelner Hoover. The images in the collection range from the State Normal School in 1925 through 1982.
- Castillo (Oscar R.) Photograph Collection Approximately 5000 images from the collection of the Los Angeles based photographer, Oscar Castillo. The collection documents images of social, cultural and artistic import to the Chicano/Latino community.
- Getty Research Institute Digital Collections Digital Collections provide free access to a growing number of digitized items from the Research Library, Special Collections, Photo Archive, and Institutional Archives. These materials include photographs, and other documents relating to Los Angeles and Southern California
- Huntington Digital Library The Huntington Library houses approximately 500,000 prints and negatives spanning the century from 1850 to 1950. One collection is the Maynard L. Parker collection of approximately 58,000 negatives, transparencies, and photographs related to a wide range of American architects, publishers, and designers of the postwar era. The Huntington Digital Library is the online database of Huntington Library digitized materials.
- Imagine Santa Monica This digital collection includes the Santa Monica Public Library Image Archives (1875-present ) and the Outlook newspaper (1875-1916).
- Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection More than 60,000 images from the Los Angeles Central Library History Department's Photo Collection are available online. Images have been selected to represent the history of the growth of Los Angeles and California, Southern California life, and frequently requested subjects such as major events.
- Los Angeles Times Photographic Archive (UCLA Library Digital Collections) Photonegatives and photographic prints documenting events and people in Southern California, the US, and the world. The material originates from the Los Angeles Times newspaper and includes glass negatives (ca. 1918-1932), nitrate negatives (ca. 1925-45), and safety negatives (ca. 1935-1990). Also includes prints and negatives from the Los Angeles Times Orange County and San Diego bureaus.
- Online Archive of California (OAC) This link opens in a new window Finding aids for primary source collections in all UC campuses and other contributing institutions, including libraries, special collections, archives, historical societies, and museums throughout California.
- Photo Study Collection (Getty Research Institute) The Photo Study Collection's two million photographs facilitate the study of fine arts from antiquity to the modern period. The collection's strength lies in the photographic reproduction of western art, architecture, and decorative arts.
- Special Collections (Getty Research Institute) Many of the special collections housed at the GRI include drawings, photographs, and other visual media. Their strengths include art history in Europe, the Mediterranean, Latin America, and areas of European colonization, as well as architecture and design. Recent acquisitions include Asian art and its reception in the west and documentation of Southern California's artists, museums, and collections in the latter part of the 20th century.
- Tract Maps and Cadastral Maps of Southern California, 1868-1937 (UCLA Library Digital Collections) The tract and cadastral maps in this collection are of real estate developments located in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and Ventura counties. The maps are listed by location using the Thomas Brothers Maps' Los Angeles County Popular Street Atlas, 1931, Orange County, 1981, Riverside County, 1978, and Ventura County, 1979.
- UC Berkeley Bancroft Library The Bancroft Library is the primary special collections library at the University of California, Berkeley. Includes over eight million photographs and pictorial items.
- UCLA Image Library Designed to support UCLA branding, for campus communications and to help to tell the UCLA story. Only registered users may download images.(Site managed by UCLA Marketing & Special Events.)
- UCLA Library Digital Collections Rare and unique digital materials developed by the UCLA Library to support education, research, service, and creative expression, including the AIDS Poster Collection, the Los Angeles Times Photographic Archive and more. Legacy site with additional content also available.
- UCLA Photography UCLA Photography specializes in Event, Sports, Product, Architectural and Portrait photography. They also house an archive of UCLA photographs dating back to the 1940's.
- USC Digital Library The USC Digital Library offers digital images of drawings, illuminated manuscripts, maps, photographs, posters, prints, rare illustrated books, as well as audio and video recordings. Encompassing the subject strengths of the vast collections of the libraries at the University of Southern California, these materials represent the applied sciences, fine and decorative arts, history, performing arts, and social sciences.
- What was Where A growing collection of historical photographs linked to their locations (on Google Maps).
- The Benjamin and Gladys Thomas Air Photo Archives, 1918-1971 - Oblique photographs of California. Originals are housed in the UCLA Department of Geography.
- Calisphere: UCLA Historic Photographs The UCLA Historic Photographs collection is drawn from many collections held in the UCLA University Archives. Many photographs in this collection are drawn from the photographs taken by Thelner Hoover. The images in the collection range from the State Normal School in 1925 through 1982.
- Calisphere: UCLA Historic Photographs The UCLA Historic Photographs collection is drawn from many collections held in the UCLA University Archives. Many photographs in this collection are drawn from the photographs taken by Thelner Hoover. The images in the collection range from the State Normal School in 1925 through 1982.
- Hoover Collection : images of UCLA, 1927-1964 A collection of images of UCLA, including construction images of several major buildings designed by George W. Kelham, aerial views of the Westwood campus, and faculty and students during the 1930's.
- UCLA Centennial 2019 Story Map An interactive story presenting 100 years of the UCLA Campus. Most maps presented in this story are part of the UCLA Henry J. Bruman Map Collection.
- UCLA Image Library Designed to support UCLA branding, for campus communications and to help to tell the UCLA story. Only registered users may download images.(Site managed by UCLA Marketing & Special Events.)
- UCLA Photography UCLA Photography specializes in Event, Sports, Product, Architectural and Portrait photography. They also house an archive of UCLA photographs dating back to the 1940's.
- UCLA Public Art Collection Images of artwork located in public spaces across the UCLA campus (in ARTstor, via JSTOR Forum). Does not include work under the curatorial purview of the Fowler Museum, the Hammer Museum, or the Medical Center Art Collection.
- University of California Atkinson Photographic Archive: Los Angeles campus Photographs commissioned by Richard Atkinson in 2002-2003 to document architecture found on UC's campuses
- The Visual History of UCLA as Told Through 10,000+ Images Features photographic prints from the University Archives Photographic Reference collection.
