Art Institute of Chicago

aid: art-institute-of-chicago
name: Art Institute of Chicago
description: >-
  The Art Institute of Chicago publishes an open, REST + Elasticsearch-style
  Public API for ~120,000 artworks plus agents (artists/makers), places,
  galleries, exhibitions, tours, mobile sounds, museum-shop products,
  publications, sections, sites, educator resources, digital and printed
  publications, and static archive images. Most data is CC0 1.0; descriptions
  and place data are CC-BY 4.0. No API key required; anonymous limit is 60
  requests/minute per IP. Clients should send an AIC-User-Agent header for
  courtesy tracking. The canonical aggregator (Laravel) is open source on
  GitHub, and nightly bulk data dumps are published in a sibling repo.
url: https://api.artic.edu/docs/
image: https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/AIC-LOGO/full/300,/0/default.jpg
specificationVersion: '0.20'
created: '2026-05-28'
modified: '2026-05-29'
x-source: public-apis/public-apis
x-type: opensource
x-category: "Art & Design"
x-tier: 2
x-tier-reason: opensource-with-public-openapi-and-mcp
tags:
  - Art And Design
  - Museum
  - Open Data
  - Cultural Heritage
  - IIIF
  - Public APIs
  - Open Source
apis:
  - name: Art Institute of Chicago Public API
    description: >-
      Open REST and search API surfacing the museum's collection, agents,
      exhibitions, tours, publications, products and operational data
      (galleries, hours, sites). Backed by Elasticsearch; data refreshed
      nightly. Read-only.
    humanURL: https://api.artic.edu/docs/
    baseURL: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1
    tags:
      - Art And Design
      - Museum
      - Open Data
    properties:
      - type: Documentation
        url: https://api.artic.edu/docs/
      - type: OpenAPI
        url: openapi/art-institute-of-chicago-openapi.yml
      - type: OpenAPI
        url: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/openapi.json
      - type: Authentication
        url: https://api.artic.edu/docs/
      - type: RateLimits
        url: rate-limits/art-institute-of-chicago-rate-limits.yml
      - type: License
        url: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
      - type: Example
        url: examples/art-institute-of-chicago-artworks-list-example.json
      - type: Example
        url: examples/art-institute-of-chicago-agents-list-example.json
      - type: Example
        url: examples/art-institute-of-chicago-exhibitions-list-example.json
      - type: Example
        url: examples/art-institute-of-chicago-galleries-list-example.json
      - type: Example
        url: examples/art-institute-of-chicago-places-list-example.json
      - type: Example
        url: examples/art-institute-of-chicago-products-list-example.json
      - type: Example
        url: examples/art-institute-of-chicago-tours-list-example.json
      - type: Example
        url: examples/art-institute-of-chicago-exhibitions-search-example.json
      - type: JSONSchema
        url: json-schema/art-institute-of-chicago-artwork-schema.json
      - type: JSONSchema
        url: json-schema/art-institute-of-chicago-agent-schema.json
      - type: JSONSchema
        url: json-schema/art-institute-of-chicago-place-schema.json
      - type: JSONSchema
        url: json-schema/art-institute-of-chicago-gallery-schema.json
      - type: JSONSchema
        url: json-schema/art-institute-of-chicago-exhibition-schema.json
      - type: JSONSchema
        url: json-schema/art-institute-of-chicago-product-schema.json
      - type: JSONSchema
        url: json-schema/art-institute-of-chicago-tour-schema.json
      - type: JSONStructure
        url: json-structure/art-institute-of-chicago-artwork-structure.json
      - type: JSONStructure
        url: json-structure/art-institute-of-chicago-agent-structure.json
      - type: JSONStructure
        url: json-structure/art-institute-of-chicago-place-structure.json
      - type: JSONStructure
        url: json-structure/art-institute-of-chicago-gallery-structure.json
      - type: JSONStructure
        url: json-structure/art-institute-of-chicago-exhibition-structure.json
      - type: JSONStructure
        url: json-structure/art-institute-of-chicago-product-structure.json
      - type: JSONStructure
        url: json-structure/art-institute-of-chicago-tour-structure.json
      - type: JSON-LD
        url: json-ld/art-institute-of-chicago-context.jsonld
  - name: IIIF Image API
    description: >-
      IIIF Image API 2.0-compliant service for delivering image binaries for
      artworks. Combine artwork.image_id with config.iiif_url returned by the
      Public API.
    humanURL: https://api.artic.edu/docs/#iiif-image-api
    baseURL: https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2
    tags:
      - IIIF
      - Images
    properties:
      - type: Documentation
        url: https://api.artic.edu/docs/#iiif-image-api
      - type: Specification
        url: https://iiif.io/api/image/2.0/
  - name: Bulk Data Dumps
    description: >-
      Nightly data dumps of the collection and related resources, published as
      JSON in a public GitHub repository. Recommended for bulk consumers
      instead of scraping the API.
    humanURL: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/api-data
    baseURL: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/api-data
    tags:
      - Bulk Data
      - Open Data
    properties:
      - type: GitHubRepository
        url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/api-data
common:
  - type: Website
    url: https://www.artic.edu/
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://api.artic.edu/docs/
  - type: Portal
    url: https://api.artic.edu/docs/
  - type: TermsOfService
    url: https://www.artic.edu/terms/terms-and-conditions
  - type: PrivacyPolicy
    url: https://www.artic.edu/privacy
  - type: Support
    url: mailto:[email protected]
  - type: GitHubOrganization
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago
  - type: GitHubRepository
    name: data-aggregator
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/data-aggregator
  - type: GitHubRepository
    name: api-data
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/api-data
  - type: GitHubRepository
    name: aic-bash
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/aic-bash
  - type: SDK
    name: aic-bash
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/aic-bash
    description: Bash script that queries the API for public-domain artworks and renders them as ASCII art.
  - type: Tools
    name: Browser Extension
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/browser-extension
    description: Show a random artwork from the collection in a new browser tab.
  - type: Tools
    name: aic-mobile-android
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/aic-mobile-android
    description: Official Art Institute of Chicago mobile app for Android (Kotlin).
  - type: Tools
    name: aic-mobile-ios
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/aic-mobile-ios
    description: Official Art Institute of Chicago mobile app for iOS (Swift).
  - type: Tools
    name: aic-mobile-cms
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/aic-mobile-cms
    description: CMS that powers the official mobile apps.
  - type: Tools
    name: twill
    url: https://github.com/art-institute-of-chicago/twill
    description: Open-source Laravel CMS toolkit originally built at the Art Institute.
  - type: Tools
    name: artic-mcp (community)
    url: https://github.com/mikechao/artic-mcp
    description: >-
      Community-built Model Context Protocol (MCP) server providing
      natural-language access to the Art Institute of Chicago Collection.
      TypeScript, MIT-licensed; not officially maintained by the museum.
  - type: SpectralRules
    url: rules/art-institute-of-chicago-rules.yml
  - type: Vocabulary
    url: vocabulary/art-institute-of-chicago-vocabulary.yml
  - type: NaftikoCapability
    url: capabilities/shared/art-institute-of-chicago.yaml
  - type: NaftikoCapability
    url: capabilities/browse-collection.yaml
  - type: NaftikoCapability
    url: capabilities/research-artist.yaml
  - type: NaftikoCapability
    url: capabilities/plan-museum-visit.yaml
  - type: NaftikoCapability
    url: capabilities/mobile-audio-tour.yaml
  - type: NaftikoCapability
    url: capabilities/education-resources.yaml
  - type: NaftikoCapability
    url: capabilities/museum-shop.yaml
  - type: NaftikoCapability
    url: capabilities/global-search.yaml
  - type: Plans
    url: plans/art-institute-of-chicago-plans-pricing.yml
  - type: RateLimits
    url: rate-limits/art-institute-of-chicago-rate-limits.yml
  - type: PublicAPIsListing
    url: https://github.com/public-apis/public-apis
features:
  - name: Open Collection Data
    description: ~120,000 artworks plus rich metadata, openly licensed and free to use.
  - name: Elasticsearch-Powered Search
    description: Full-text and DSL search on every major resource (q, query, sort, from, size, facets).
  - name: IIIF Image Delivery
    description: Standards-compliant image delivery via IIIF Image API 2.0 with hotlinking allowed.
  - name: Sparse Fieldsets and Batch Fetch
    description: fields= and ids= parameters reduce payload size and round trips.
  - name: Nightly Bulk Dumps
    description: api-data repo provides full JSON dumps as an alternative to scraping.
  - name: Authority Alignment
    description: Places aligned to Getty TGN, agents aligned to Getty ULAN.
useCases:
  - name: Cultural-Heritage Research
    description: Search and aggregate artworks, artists, places and exhibitions for scholarly work.
  - name: Educational Apps and Lessons
    description: Build classroom tools using artworks, educator resources and digital publications.
  - name: Visitor-Planning Apps
    description: Show what is on view today via exhibitions, galleries, hours, and tours.
  - name: Mobile Audio Tours
    description: Drive in-gallery audio experiences with tours and mobile-sounds endpoints.
  - name: Generative and AI Workflows
    description: Public-domain artworks make ideal training and grounding data for image/RAG pipelines.
  - name: Creative Reuse
    description: Browser extensions, ASCII renderers, screensavers and embeddings demos already exist as exemplars.
integrations:
  - name: IIIF
    description: International Image Interoperability Framework for image delivery and presentation manifests.
  - name: Getty Vocabularies
    description: TGN (places) and ULAN (agents) authority IDs returned with records.
  - name: schema.org
    description: Linked-data alignment provided in json-ld/art-institute-of-chicago-context.jsonld.
  - name: Elasticsearch
    description: Underlying search engine; query DSL is exposed via search endpoints.
  - name: Twill CMS
    description: The museum's open-source Laravel CMS used to publish editorial content.
  - name: Model Context Protocol
    description: Community-built MCP server (mikechao/artic-mcp) for AI-assistant access.
solutions:
  - name: Public Domain Image Reuse
    description: Use any artwork flagged is_public_domain=true at any resolution without restriction.
maintainers:
  - FN: Kin Lane
    email: [email protected]