Art history in the Netherlands is supported by a number of art libraries in addition to museum libraries, among them the Royal Library at The Hague, the libraries of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and the Central Research Laboratory for Objects of Art and Science, both at Amsterdam, university libraries, and libraries of Dutch establishments abroad. The combined art collections of these libraries are considerable; access, however, may be facilitated by the Project for Integrated Catalogue Automation (PICA) which aims to improve on the diversity of existing catalogues.

In addition to Dutch academic and museum libraries, a number of art libraries and relevant document and information centres are attached to government and other institutions. These include the Netherlands Institute for Art History at The Hague (the parent institution of DIAL, an iconographical classification of Dutch art); the Stichting MARDOC at Rotterdam, which is evolving thesauri to facilitate automated access to museum collections; and the Netherlands Office for Fine Art, responsible for coordinating and promoting Dutch art collections. Other institutions are concerned with contemporary Dutch art, photography, architecture, the role of art in society, art education, and museology. Some of these, with some other institutions, are linked by the network Culturele Pool (CUPO) which coordinates and indexes current literature on the art in the broadest sense.

With one exception Dutch art museum libraries date from the second half of the 19th century or later. In general, museum libraries reflect the scope of the museum they serve and exist primarily for the use of museum staff although the public are also admitted. Most now use the same cataloguing rules; manual catalogues are still commonplace but are likely to be displaced by the computer.

Dutch scholarship is so international in outlook that it tends to overlook the particular contributions of the Dutch themselves. The last general overview of Dutch scholarly literature appeared thirty-five years ago, Wabeke’s A guide to Dutch bibliographies (1951). The following survey offers an interim update of bibliographical material for art historians. The compilers are dismayed that there is so little that can be listed here, not least because of promising initiatives which have not been brought to fruition. The introduction of automated data processing improves access to information but does not help to teach students the use and value of bibliographies. The list proceeds from the general to the specific.

A survey of current Dutch periodicals, devoted to the visual arts (including architecture) or of related interest. A noteworthy feature of art literature in the Netherlands is the contribution made to it by student journals. The quantity and variety of Dutch art periodicals has increased in recent years, enriching art literature but posing problems regarding its bibliographical control.

The Rijkmuseum Meermanno-Westreenianum at The Hague has as its core the former private collection, rich in manuscripts and incunabula, of Willem van Westreenen, who was able to acquire material from the earlier collections of Gerard and Johan Meerman. Maintained as a static collection, seldom open to the public, for more than a century, the Museum has since 1960 developed into a vital centre for fine printing, now including examples of modern typography alongside its older treasures.

The library of the 19th century caricaturist Alexander Ver Huell, many of its volumes annotated and embellished by their former owner, was bequeathed by him to the town of Arnhem and is now incorporated in Arnhem Public Library. Its contents reflect his interests and values – values which, not least a belief in the moral virtue and social role of art, he cherished apart from society’s antipathy.

The Museum Willet-Holthuysen, comprising the house and private collections of Abram Willet and his wife Louisa Holthuysen, was bequeathed to Amsterdam on the death of the latter and in 1929 became the home of the Institute of Art History of the University of Amsterdam. The collection of books, originally scattered through the house, had previously been gathered together, and although added to up until 1965 remained essentially the reference library of a 19th century collector whose special interests were the decorative arts, particularly glass and ceramics. The art historical volumes were moved with the Institute in 1961-62 and remain in the care of the Institute’s Library; they are likely to become more accessible when the Institute is rehoused once more in the near future.

The Library of the Faculty of Architecture in the University of Technology at Delft includes two important private collections. The Peters Collection comprises material formerly owned by the Gothic Revival architect Cornelis Hendrick Peters and includes architectural and topographical drawings and prints as well as books. The Leliman Library comprises the library of the Classical architect J.H. Leliman, augmented by his son, Johannes Hendrik Willem Leliman, himself an architect who specialized in housing, an associate of the garden city movement and advocate for the preservation of old buildings.

CADENS is a project based at the Institute of Art History at the University of Nijmegen. The intention is to provide comprehensive access to information on contemporary art contained in all Dutch 19th century art exhibition catalogues, by means of a computer database. Two publications, a directory of artists and a keyword index, are envisaged.

Artists’ books have been exhibited several times in the Netherlands since the late 1970s, notably at the Van Reekummuseum at Apeldoorn. They can be purchased from Galerie A in Amsterdam, and collections can be found in several Dutch museums including the Stedelijk Museum, the Stedelijk Van Abbemuseum, and the Groninger Museum, although problems associated with storage and conservation tend to inhibit access.

The loan of works of art to the public was initiated in the Netherlands in 1955 through a scheme set up by a group of artists to encourage people to purchase contemporary art. The success of this scheme attracted support from the government, which was itself acquiring works in the process of assisting artists. Works thus acquired were lent to public institutions and government bodies, but from the 1970s they were also made available for loan to the public via artotheques. These two schemes gave rise to over a hundred art lending centres including hybrid establishments owing something to both; however, direct government support of artists has recently been phased out, and as a result artotheques no longer obtain works via the government and must evolve alternative methods of acquisition.