This curated digital project of over 500 works from the collection provides just a glimpse at the vast holdings in the University art collection. Comprised of more than 13,000 works of art in all media, across multiple time periods and cultures worldwide, the collection is available for research and study, curricular use, and educational programs, and may be requested as external loans for special exhibitions.

We endeavored to identify these in the descriptions of individual decks, but we welcome feedback at Properties, based in Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, oversees Columbia University's art collection. These decks include historical representations of various cultural and ethnic groups in racist, sexist, or other ways that may be offensive or harmful. Decks (in their entirety or just the most interesting parts) were mounted onto 16' x 20' sheets of black paper, generally four suits across including, if useful, samples of the backs, and/or pip cards, any instructions included with the deck and noting interesting aspects such as makers' marks and tax stamps with yellow dots. Cards digitized in 2018 represent most of the pre-1801 cards, as mounted by scholar-collector Albert Field (1916-2003 CC '38). Holdings are especially strong from early modern England, revolutionary France, the early American Republic, across a broad range of nineteenth-century national styles, and especially in transformation cards. The decks, ranging from the 16th through the 20th centuries, and across the world, are a rich vein of primary source material in popular imagery, costume, advertising, propaganda, as well as elite culture. The Albert Field Collection of Playing Cards contains more than 6300 individual decks of playing cards as well as extensive ephemera and a library of reference books.

Ernst neufert bert seidel