The Institute of Art History Photo Library holds around 25,250 photographs of drawings made from 1937 onwards by the German art historian Walter Gernsheim, editor of the journal Corpus Photographicum of Drawings.

Although the first documented contacts between the Institute of Art History and Walter Gernsheim date back to 1954, it was only in 1958 that the Institute subscribed to the Corpus Photographicum of Drawings, a project that Gernsheim had created with assistance of his wife Jutta Lauke.

The collaboration with Gernsheim, established at the prompting of Alessandro Bettagno (1919-2004), then secretary of the Institute of Art History, consisted, on one hand, in facilitating his access to the main Venetian collections and, on the other, in sourcing useful materials to enrich the recently established Cini Photo Library. All of this was in line with the Institute's interests in graphic art and the first exhibitions of drawings at the Foundation. Inspired by the same interests, the German art historian wanted to offer an effective study resource consisting of photographic documentation of the drawings preserved in the collections of institutions, museums and libraries in Europe and America.

Since 1968, at the request of the then director of the Institute, Giuseppe Fiocco (1884-1971), work began "to save all the photographs of drawings by Venetian masters reproduced... in many years of valid work" through the purchase of the back numbers with funds allocated by the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR).

In 1972 the subscription to the Corpus Photographicum was limited to photographs of Italian school drawings.

The collection kept in the Photo Library of the Institute of Art History brings together about 25,250 photographs, thus only a part, however significant, of the entire Corpus Photographicum of Drawings, which consists of approximately 175,000 images. The photographs (all black and white gelatin prints mounted on large cards) are topographically ordered in a specific section of the Photo Library.

The indices are very useful aids for consulting the material. They consist of typewritten lists stored in eleven numbered albums with several pieces of information, such as the current location and the measurements of the drawing reproduced, as well as an acronym for the media used by the artist. The album IX is devoted to back numbers.
The Institute of Art History Photo Library holds around 25,250 photographs of drawings made from 1937 onwards by the German art historian Walter Gernsheim, editor of the journal Corpus Photographicum of Drawings.