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Internship, fellowship, and volunteer opportunities provide students and lifelong learners with the ability to contribute to the study and preservation of visual arts records in America.
About the Terra Foundation Center for Digital Collections
February 12, 2005
The Oscar Bluemner papers were digitized in 2008.
In 2005, the Archives of American Art and the Terra Foundation for American Art set out to create an unparalleled virtual repository for the study of the visual arts of the United States. As one of the Terra Foundation’s first grant recipients, the Archives received a multi-million dollar award to support the establishment of a digitization program that at the end of five years resulted in free access to a substantial cross-section of the Archives’ most significant collections. These funds enabled Archives staff to develop an innovative, archival approach to large-scale digitization, to design and program a technical infrastructure and public web interface, to arrange and process collections, and to manage the resulting digital repository that comprised over 1.5 million digital files by the end of the grant’s five-year period.
In spring 2011, a second multi-million dollar grant was awarded to support another five years of the digitization project and the establishment of the Terra Foundation Center for Digital Collections in keeping with the foundation’s priority of making research resources on American art available to people around the globe.
View all of our digitized collections or access the more than 15,000 documents that have been individually cataloged through the Archives' collection search.
The Terra Foundation for American Art (opens in new window) is dedicated to fostering the exploration, understanding, and enjoyment of the visual arts of the United States. Established in 1978, it has become a leading organization focused on historical American art, supporting worldwide study and presentation through its grants, initiatives, partnerships, art collection, and other resources. Operating from offices in Chicago and Paris, the Terra Foundation works to bring American art to the world and the world to American art, devoting approximately $12 million annually for exhibitions, research, and projects around the globe.
Contact Information:
Karen Weiss, Head of Digital Operations weissk@si.edu
Archives of American Art in the Smithsonian Transcription Center
You can help make digitized historical documents more findable and useful by transcribing their text.
Visit the Archives of American Art project page in the Smithsonian Transcription Center now.
Terra Foundation Center for Digital Collections
A virtual repository of a substantial cross-section of the Archives' most significant collections.