Overview

Get a head start on your research and creative projects with our online research guides, chat, and email research assistance, and Zoom research consultations. Discover articles, e-books, data, museum quality images, streaming music and films, and much more, all selected to support and enrich your creative, academic, and entrepreneurial work. Ask us for your course texts available electronically or on reserve in the library. In the library space, find computers, printers, scanners, quiet areas, and study rooms. Borrow from our arts-focused book collection or our media & equipment collection that includes cameras, camcorders, projectors, microphones, and phone chargers; all of these services are available via appointment.

Participate in programming focused on library collections that both inspires and supports your creative work and connects you to campus and city-wide communities of practice.

Our friendly and informed librarians are ready to assist you! Contact us via Chat or Ask a Librarian anytime!

Library Mission

The mission of the Columbia College Chicago Library is to support the College and its academic programs by providing access to information resources and teaching students to evaluate and use them. Our Library has a teaching mission and is committed to preparing our users to be lifelong learners in an information rich society. It is a gathering place for intellectual and artistic freedom and expression, where we consistently surprise and delight our community with a fierce dedication to coloring outside of the lines in support of continuing education, research, and creative practice.

Collection Overview

The Library supports the educational needs of all academic departments at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. We house one of the largest collections of art materials in the Chicago area including strong collections ranging from art, photography, communications, journalism, and film/video to resources in arts management and marketing. 

Our collections include a general circulating collection, periodicals, audio-visual, film and television scripts, music scores, a teaching materials collection, and the College Archives & Special Collections.

The Collection in Numbers

Print
  • Books: 201,626
  • Serials: 274

Electronic
  • E-Books: 42,561
  • E-journals: 46,258
  • Research databases: 155
  •  

Media
  • Film and music titles: 37,466
  • Streaming media: 999,208

Affiliations

black metropolis research consortium    CARLI logo       chicago collections logo

RAILS logo

×