The Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona is collaborating on a release of nearly 36,000 photographs in the Artstor Digital Library.

The Center is recognized as one of the world’s finest academic art museums and study centers for the history of photography. It opened in 1975, following a meeting between the University President John Schaefer and Ansel Adams. According to Schaefer, “No other universities were really collecting photography, or looking at it as an art form or social document.” Beginning with the archives of five living master photographers—Ansel Adams, Wynn Bullock, Harry Callahan, Aaron Siskind, and Frederick Sommer—the collection has grown to include 239 archival collections. Among these are some of the most recognizable names in 20th century North American photography: W. Eugene Smith, Lola Alvarez Bravo, Edward Weston, and Garry Winogrand.

Altogether there are over five million archival objects in the Center’s collection, including negatives, work prints, contact sheets, albums, scrapbooks, correspondence, writings, audiovisual materials, and memorabilia. In addition to whole archival collections, the Center also actively acquired individual photographs by modern and contemporary photographers, including Kristin Capp, Joe Deal, and David Muench. There are currently more than 90,000 works by over 2,200 photographers. A library of books, journals, and exhibition and auction catalogs, including many rare publications, plus an extensive oral history collection complements the archival and fine print collections. The combined art, archival, and research collections at the Center provide an unparalleled resource for research, exhibitions, loans, and traveling exhibitions.

This collection is an essential resource for Photography and a rich repository for Interdisciplinary Studies, supporting research in Environmental Studies, Geography, Social History, and Sustainability.