Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 June 2016
The Frick Art Reference Library has one of the world’s richest historic collections of catalogs of art sold at auction. Awareness and use of this collection has increased as independent scholars and the staff of museums rigorously investigate issues of provenance. Another factor in the increasing recognition of auction sale catalogs is their value as economic documents that may shed light on broader trends, topics that sometimes resonate beyond the field of art historical scholarship.
This article is based on a portion of the talk given at the Art Libraries Section workshop at the IFLA conference in Berlin, August 2003.