# Art Institute of Chicago API
> The Art Institute of Chicago collection as an API — clean JSON, no key. Run a full-text search across 130,000+ artworks and open any piece for its full detail: title, artist, dates, medium, dimensions, place of origin, department and classification, credit line, provenance and exhibition history, whether it is public domain or on view, and high-resolution IIIF images. Browse the collection, search artists for their biography and life dates, and list the museum's exhibitions. Live data straight from artic.edu, one of the world's great art museums. A distinct collection — ideal for art, education and culture apps, image galleries, museum kiosks and creative tools. 7 data endpoints. Authenticated with an x-oanor-key; fair-use rate limits per plan.

## Authentication
All requests require your oanor API key in the `x-oanor-key` header. Get one at https://www.oanor.com/developer/keys.

```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: oanor_live_…" "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/..."
```

## Pricing
- **Free** (Free) — 4,000 calls/Mo, 5 req/s
- **Starter** ($6/Mo) — 51,000 calls/Mo, 15 req/s
- **Pro** ($25/Mo) — 265,000 calls/Mo, 30 req/s
- **Mega** ($83/Mo) — 1,080,000 calls/Mo, 80 req/s

## Endpoints

### Artworks

#### `GET /v1/artwork` — Artwork detail (IIIF image)

**Parameters:**
- `id` (query, required, string) — Artwork id Example: `27992`

**Example:**
```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: $KEY" \
  "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/v1/artwork?id=27992"
```

**Response:**
```json
{
    "data": {
        "artwork": {
            "id": 27992,
            "image": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/2d484387-2509-5e8e-2c43-22f9981972eb/full/1686,/0/default.jpg",
            "style": "Pointillism",
            "title": "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte — 1884",
            "artist": "Georges Seurat",
            "medium": "Oil on canvas",
            "gallery": "Gallery 240",
            "alt_text": "Large painting of people in a crowded park, brushstrokes are dots.",
            "date_end": 1886,
            "artist_id": 40810,
            "categories": [
                "Painting and Sculpture of Europe",
                "Art Institute Icons",
                "Essentials",
                "Save Ferris"
            ],
            "date_start": 1884,
            "department": "Painting and Sculpture of Europe",
            "dimensions": "207.5 × 308.1 cm (81 3/4 × 121 1/4 in.)",
            "is_on_view": true,
            "provenance": "By descent to Mme. Seurat, the artist’s mother (died 1899), Paris, 1891; by descent to Emile Seurat, the artist’s brother; sold for 800 francs to Casimir Brû, Paris, 1900; given by him to his daughter, Lucie, Paris, 1900; Lucie Brû Cousturier and Edmond Cousturier, Paris; sold for $20,000 possibly through Charles Vildrac, Paris to Frederic Clay and Helen Birch Bartlett, Chicago, 1924; given to the Art Institute, 1926.",
            "techniques": [
                "oil painting",
                "painting techniques",
      
…(truncated, see openapi.json for full schema)
```

#### `GET /v1/artworks` — Browse the collection

**Parameters:**
- `page` (query, optional, string) — Page Example: `1`
- `limit` (query, optional, string) — Per page Example: `20`

**Example:**
```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: $KEY" \
  "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/v1/artworks?page=1&limit=20"
```

**Response:**
```json
{
    "data": {
        "count": 20,
        "artworks": [
            {
                "id": 116399,
                "image": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/51d9f203-0653-2079-e96a-d6be82851f8a/full/843,/0/default.jpg",
                "title": "Boy's Armor",
                "artist": null,
                "thumbnail": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/51d9f203-0653-2079-e96a-d6be82851f8a/full/200,/0/default.jpg",
                "date_display": "late 17th century",
                "classification": "suit"
            },
            {
                "id": 99766,
                "image": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/1221a4a5-0b72-41df-3624-98abb53cf3a9/full/843,/0/default.jpg",
                "title": "Untitled (Butterfly Habitat)",
                "artist": "Joseph Cornell",
                "thumbnail": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/1221a4a5-0b72-41df-3624-98abb53cf3a9/full/200,/0/default.jpg",
                "date_display": "c. 1940",
                "classification": "sculpture"
            },
            {
                "id": 69454,
                "image": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/c04c60e8-5488-e191-1631-13f62c575d72/full/843,/0/default.jpg",
                "title": "Bedcover",
                "artist": null,
                "thumbnail": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/c04c60e8-5488-e191-1631-13f62c575d72/full/200,/0/default.jpg",
                "date_display": "1778",
                "classification": "needlework - quilt"
            },
            {
            
…(truncated, see openapi.json for full schema)
```

#### `GET /v1/search` — Search artworks

**Parameters:**
- `query` (query, required, string) — Full-text query Example: `monet`
- `page` (query, optional, string) — Page (1-based) Example: `1`
- `limit` (query, optional, string) — Per page (1–100) Example: `20`

**Example:**
```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: $KEY" \
  "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/v1/search?query=monet&page=1&limit=20"
```

**Response:**
```json
{
    "data": {
        "count": 20,
        "query": "monet",
        "artworks": [
            {
                "id": 16568,
                "image": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/3c27b499-af56-f0d5-93b5-a7f2f1ad5813/full/843,/0/default.jpg",
                "title": "Water Lilies",
                "artist": "Claude Monet",
                "thumbnail": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/3c27b499-af56-f0d5-93b5-a7f2f1ad5813/full/200,/0/default.jpg",
                "date_display": "1906",
                "classification": "oil on canvas"
            },
            {
                "id": 16571,
                "image": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/0f1cc0e0-e42e-be16-3f71-2022da38cb93/full/843,/0/default.jpg",
                "title": "Arrival of the Normandy Train, Gare Saint-Lazare",
                "artist": "Claude Monet",
                "thumbnail": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/0f1cc0e0-e42e-be16-3f71-2022da38cb93/full/200,/0/default.jpg",
                "date_display": "1877",
                "classification": "painting"
            },
            {
                "id": 64818,
                "image": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/a38e2828-ec6f-ece1-a30f-70243449197b/full/843,/0/default.jpg",
                "title": "Stacks of Wheat (End of Summer)",
                "artist": "Claude Monet",
                "thumbnail": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/a38e2828-ec6f-ece1-a30f-70243449197b/full/200,/0/default.jpg",
                "date_display": "1890–91",
            
…(truncated, see openapi.json for full schema)
```

### Artists

#### `GET /v1/artist` — Artist detail

**Parameters:**
- `id` (query, required, string) — Artist id Example: `35809`

**Example:**
```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: $KEY" \
  "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/v1/artist?id=35809"
```

**Response:**
```json
{
    "data": {
        "artist": {
            "id": 35809,
            "name": "Claude Monet",
            "is_artist": true,
            "sort_name": "Monet, Claude",
            "birth_date": 1840,
            "death_date": 1926,
            "description": "<p>Claude Monet was a pioneer of the French artistic movement known as Impressionism. Throughout his long career, Monet portrayed the people closest to him and the places he knew best. He favored family and friends as models, often working and exhibiting alongside fellow artists. In the early years he painted the forests of Fountainbleau, Parisian boulevards, suburban villages along the Seine, seaside towns, and flowering fields, and later, after buying a house at Giverny northwest of Paris, stacks of wheat and water lilies.&nbsp;Monet was a proponent of <em>plein air </em>painting, working directly out-of-doors on compositions he would later revise and sometimes complete in his studio. He painted his beloved water lilies in Giverny, where he tended to a water garden and a small pond spanned by a Japanese footbridge. Another favorite subject, <em>meules</em> (stacks of wheat sometimes referred to as “haystacks”), were for Monet a resonant symbol of sustenance and survival—constructed by humans but created by nature.</p><p>While Monet’s series paintings appear compositionally simple, the artist adapted his palette and brushwork to each temporal situation, conveying the complexity of color, light, and texture on 
…(truncated, see openapi.json for full schema)
```

#### `GET /v1/artists` — Search artists

**Parameters:**
- `query` (query, required, string) — Artist name Example: `picasso`
- `limit` (query, optional, string) — Per page Example: `20`

**Example:**
```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: $KEY" \
  "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/v1/artists?query=picasso&limit=20"
```

**Response:**
```json
{
    "data": {
        "count": 8,
        "query": "picasso",
        "artists": [
            {
                "id": 36198,
                "name": "Pablo Picasso",
                "birth_date": 1881,
                "death_date": 1973
            },
            {
                "id": 103244,
                "name": "Museo Picasso",
                "birth_date": null,
                "death_date": null
            },
            {
                "id": 111381,
                "name": "Museo Picasso Malaga",
                "birth_date": null,
                "death_date": null
            },
            {
                "id": 93579,
                "name": "Musée national Picasso-Paris",
                "birth_date": null,
                "death_date": null
            },
            {
                "id": 14663,
                "name": "Wifredo Lam",
                "birth_date": 1902,
                "death_date": 1982
            },
            {
                "id": 35028,
                "name": "Richard Hunt",
                "birth_date": 1935,
                "death_date": 2023
            },
            {
                "id": 36782,
                "name": "Edward Steichen",
                "birth_date": 1879,
                "death_date": 1973
            },
            {
                "id": 36878,
                "name": "Rufino Tamayo",
                "birth_date": 1899,
                "death_date": 1991
            }
        ],
        "pagination":
…(truncated, see openapi.json for full schema)
```

### Exhibitions

#### `GET /v1/exhibition` — Exhibition detail

**Parameters:**
- `id` (query, required, string) — Exhibition id Example: `3365`

**Example:**
```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: $KEY" \
  "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/v1/exhibition?id=3365"
```

**Response:**
```json
{
    "data": {
        "exhibition": {
            "id": 3365,
            "image": null,
            "title": "John Massey: Cartón de Venezuela",
            "status": "Closed",
            "gallery": "Gallery 24",
            "web_url": "https://www.artic.edu/exhibitions/3365/john-massey-carton-de-venezuela",
            "description": "Gallery 24\nOne of Chicago’s great design stories emerged from the Container Corporation of America (CCA) in the middle of the 20th century.",
            "is_featured": false
        }
    },
    "meta": {
        "timestamp": "2026-06-07T16:46:12.633Z",
        "request_id": "005c8c2d-9ca5-4a95-b4fa-50447d662c87"
    },
    "status": "ok",
    "message": "Exhibition retrieved successfully",
    "success": true
}
```

#### `GET /v1/exhibitions` — Exhibitions

**Parameters:**
- `query` (query, optional, string) — Optional search
- `limit` (query, optional, string) — Per page Example: `20`

**Example:**
```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: $KEY" \
  "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/v1/exhibitions?limit=20"
```

**Response:**
```json
{
    "data": {
        "count": 20,
        "pagination": {
            "limit": 20,
            "total": 6254,
            "offset": 0,
            "total_pages": 313,
            "current_page": 1
        },
        "exhibitions": [
            {
                "id": 3365,
                "image": null,
                "title": "John Massey: Cartón de Venezuela",
                "status": "Closed",
                "gallery": "Gallery 24",
                "web_url": "https://www.artic.edu/exhibitions/3365/john-massey-carton-de-venezuela",
                "description": "Gallery 24\nOne of Chicago’s great design stories emerged from the Container Corporation of America (CCA) in the middle of the 20th century.",
                "is_featured": false
            },
            {
                "id": 3251,
                "image": "https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/d3022cbb-fd06-2933-bab7-adcdd6fb9bd4/full/843,/0/default.jpg",
                "title": "Four Followers of Caravaggio",
                "status": "Closed",
                "gallery": "Gallery 211",
                "web_url": "https://www.artic.edu/exhibitions/3251/four-followers-of-caravaggio",
                "description": "Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio earned great notoriety for his revolutionary style and for his unconventional process of painting directly from live models. The special loan of Orazio Gentileschi's The Lute Player from the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC enables us to show how four oth
…(truncated, see openapi.json for full schema)
```

### Meta

#### `GET /v1/meta` — Spec

**Example:**
```bash
curl -H "x-oanor-key: $KEY" \
  "https://api.oanor.com/artic-api/v1/meta"
```

**Response:**
```json
{
    "data": {
        "service": "artic-api",
        "endpoints": {
            "GET /v1/meta": "This document.",
            "GET /v1/artist": "Artist detail by id (e.g. 35809).",
            "GET /v1/search": "Full-text artwork search (q=, page=).",
            "GET /v1/artists": "Search artists (q=).",
            "GET /v1/artwork": "Artwork detail by id (e.g. 27992).",
            "GET /v1/artworks": "Browse the collection (page=).",
            "GET /v1/exhibition": "Exhibition detail by id.",
            "GET /v1/exhibitions": "Exhibitions (q= optional)."
        },
        "description": "Art Institute of Chicago: full-text artwork search, artwork detail with high-res IIIF images, browse the collection, artist search and detail, and exhibitions. Real live museum data, no key."
    },
    "meta": {
        "timestamp": "2026-06-07T16:46:13.101Z",
        "request_id": "691a515a-d970-4dfe-946e-b4ea2b05f219"
    },
    "status": "ok",
    "message": "Meta",
    "success": true
}
```


---
Marketplace page: https://www.oanor.com/api/artic-api
OpenAPI spec: https://www.oanor.com/api/artic-api/openapi.json