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APA Citation Style 7th Edition: A. Electronic Image

This guide will help you with formatting your citations according to the APA guidelines.

About Citing Artwork

 

There are no guidelines for paintings, sculptures, or more complicated installations. A good reference contains enough information to lead your reader to the source you used, as concisely as possible. At a minimum, this should include the artist’s name, year(s) of fabrication, title of the work, any other necessary or relevant information (such as the medium), and the location of the work.

Not only must you attend to copyright levels, you must find information that is often hidden.  Use these points as basic guidelines when citing images in your assignments, papers, and presentations:

  • Use consistent and and sequential figure numbering throughout your work, usually abbreviated as "Fig. 1" for example.
  • Include artist's name (lastname, firstname), date (in parentheses), title of work, and work type (in brackets).
  • Medium and measurements and institution which houses the work may be included after the work type.
  • Include the source from which the image came
  • For books, start with "From" followed by an italicized title, page number in parentheses, "by" the author, followed by date and publication information
  • For electronic resources, start with "Retrieved" and include retrieval date (month day, year) and "from: " followed by the URL.
  • Be consistent with caption display choices throughout your paper or slideshow.

Image from an Electronic Source

 

When citing images in-text you might add a caption that includes copyright information and a statement of permission for use.

General Format

In-Text Citation (Paraphrase):

(Artist Surname, Year)

In-Text Citation (Quotation):

(Artist Surname, Year)

References:

Artist Surname, First Initial. Second Initial. (Year). Title of the artwork [Format]. URL

Example

In-Text Citation (Paraphrase):

(Foster, 1840)

In-Text Citation (Quotation):

(Foster, 1840)

References:

Foster, B. (1840). The crucifix [image]. http://www.museum.edu/art/collections/painting/578935.html

Incorporating images into the text of your paper (SFU's Finding and Using Online Images: Citing Images in APA)

Licensed image databases (UBC's Copyright Educational Resources: Image Citation)

Learn More

 

The Online Writing Lab at Purdue University offers an online resource which can be used in some cases.  However, it does not include everything required for citing sources in one place.

The APA citation style does not cover Canadian government sources, and has only a limited section on American government resources.

Please refer to the staff at the Library Reference Desk for clarification when citing Canadian government sources.