Library

Hours and consultation

Tuesday-Friday: 2pm – 6pm

Special closures on Friday 29.03, Thursday 9.05 and Thursday 1.08

Summer closure: 6.08 to 23.08 2024

Winter closure: 24.12.2024 to 10.01.2025

On-site consultation, on request:

Free access:

  • A selection of books about artists represented in the collection, in connection with current exhibitions or about a museum’s life and activities; periodicals about fine arts.

Contact

Bibliothèque du Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts
Place de la Gare 16
1003 Lausanne
bibliotheque.mcba@plateforme10.ch
+41 21 318 44 50

Art history, artists, museology, the art market, cultural mediation, conservation, private collections…

The MCBA library offers a specialised collection of materials on the visual arts from the 19th century to today. The collection covers painting, sculpture, printmaking, drawing, video, and new media, with special emphasis on the artists who are part of the museum’s collections, artists from Vaud and the arts in the canton. Some 40,000 items (exhibition and museum catalogues, monographs on artists, specialised periodicals, auction house catalogues) are available for on-site consultation.

The library also conserves the archives of both MCBA and the Association des Amis du musée. It maintains as well the Balthus Archives, which are on long-term loan to the museum, and the library of the Toms Pauli Foundation.

To download (in french)

Resources

The complete catalogue of the MCBA's library: search here

Links

Searching the archives...

1989: Pierre Kuenzi requests access to the MCBA library

MCBA Publications

Gina Proenza

Nicole Schweizer (ed.), Gina Proenza, with contributions by Salome Hohl and Sabrina Tarasoff, and an interview with the artist by Nicolas Brulhart (FR/ENG), 64 p., Coédition MCBA, Lausanne / JRP Editions, Genève, 2024.

CHF 30.-

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Giuseppe Penone. Regards croisés

Catalogue in French, edited by Bernard Fibicher, with contributions by Giuseppe Penone, Didier Semin, Bernard Fibicher and Ruggero Penone (fr.), 160 pages, 134 colour illustrations. Published by 5 Continents, Milan and the Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts de Lausanne, 2015.

CHF 76,50

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Lubaina Himid

Michael Wellen (ed.), Lubaina Himid, with contributions by Amrita Dhallu, Christine Eyene, Lisa Merrill, Griselda Pollock, Magda Stawarska-Beavan, Carol Tulloch, Michael Wellen, and texts by Lubaina Himid
Tate Publishing, London, 2021 (Eng.) and 2022 (Fr), 192 p., 100 ill.

CHF 35.-

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