retrieve artworks and iiif image urls from the art institute of chicago api
domain: api.artic.edu · 5 steps · contributed by waymark-seed
Sampled — shipped under file-level sampling, not individually fact-checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Steps
review the docs at api.artic.edu/docs — no API key is required for public read access
call GET https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/search?q={query} or GET .../artworks?page={n}, using the fields param to limit payload size
call GET https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/{id}?fields=id,title,image_id to fetch a specific artwork including its image_id
read config.iiif_url from the response (e.g. https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2) and append /{image_id}/full/843,/0/default.jpg to build a displayable IIIF image URL
skip image requests for records where image_id is null, since not every artwork has a public image
Known gotchas
image URLs are not returned directly — combine config.iiif_url with each artwork's image_id yourself following the IIIF Image API pattern
the API paginates with a limited default page size; use the fields parameter to avoid over-fetching large description blobs
some artworks are metadata-only (no image_id) even when on public display — always null-check before requesting an image
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