Collection data APIs
How to access the Gallery's collection data.
The Gallery provides two means of accessing its collection data:
- An Elasticsearch-based API which serves JSON data in a bespoke format based upon the data structure of the Gallery's CIIM middleware - see Elasticsearch API
- A series of static pages, accessed via the relevant entity’s PID, which offer data as HTML, JSON and XML in established profiles (notably Linked Art) wherever possible - see Interoperable formats and profiles
Images
We are currently setting up a framework to deliver images using IIIF - see Collection images
Status
The current collection data framework is currently a beta version:
- Our Elasticsearch API is broadly stable: changes to the data structure are likely to be small, and would be additions to the data structure rather than changes or removals.
- We are broadly happy with our interoperable pages, but would welcome feedback on the accuracy of our data mappings and any other issues that you may encounter; please let us know via hello@nationalgallery.org.uk. There is a list of known issues at Interoperable formats and profiles.
- Our IIIF framework is still under development and, crucially, PIDs for media records will change when we set that framework up.
Licences
The Gallery's data is made available for reuse under specific licences; for more information see Licences.
Whilst we do not require you to seek permission or let us know that you're using our data, we'd very much like to hear what you're doing with it. The more people who we can say are using our data, the stronger the case we can make for maintaining and extending these data endpoints. To do this (or if you want to get in touch for any other reason), please drop us a line on hello@nationalgallery.org.uk.