Source Tutorials · May 8, 2026

How to cite an image, figure, or table

Images come from many places — museums, archives, online collections, journal articles. Each origin shapes the citation, and reproducing the image in your paper adds a separate caption requirement. This guide covers paintings, photographs, museum-collection images, online images, and figures from journal articles in APA, MLA, and Chicago.

What information you need

Image citations require: artist or creator, year, title, medium (oil on canvas, photograph, digital image), location or repository (museum, archive, website), and the URL if accessed online.

If you reproduce the image in your paper, you also need a caption — a separate text block under the image — that may include a copyright notice.

Reproduction vs. citation: Citing an image and reproducing it are two different things. Citing tells your reader where the image lives. Reproducing it in your paper requires permission unless the image is in the public domain or covered by fair use.

How to cite an image in APA 7

Format — Image online

Artist, A. A. (Year). Title of work [Medium]. Repository or Site. URL

Example — Painting in a museum collection

Hopper, E. (1942). Nighthawks [Painting]. Art Institute of Chicago. https://www.artic.edu/artworks/111628

Example — Online image

NASA. (2023, July 12). Webb captures detailed beauty of Ring Nebula [Photograph]. NASA. https://www.nasa.gov/

Figure caption in your paper

Below the figure, APA uses a numbered figure caption: Figure 1 on its own line, then a brief italicized title, then a Note. with attribution.

Figure caption

Figure 1
Ring Nebula
Note. From Webb captures detailed beauty of Ring Nebula, by NASA, 2023 (https://www.nasa.gov/). Public domain.

How to cite an image in MLA 9

MLA treats the museum or website as the container.

Format

Artist Last, First. Title. Year, Medium, Location.

Example

Hopper, Edward. Nighthawks. 1942, oil on canvas, Art Institute of Chicago.

Example — accessed online

Hopper, Edward. Nighthawks. 1942. Art Institute of Chicago, www.artic.edu/artworks/111628.

How to cite an image in Chicago

Chicago notes-bibliography

Note

1. Edward Hopper, Nighthawks, 1942, oil on canvas, Art Institute of Chicago, https://www.artic.edu/artworks/111628.

Bibliography

Hopper, Edward. Nighthawks. 1942. Oil on canvas. Art Institute of Chicago. https://www.artic.edu/artworks/111628.

Chicago author-date

Reference list

Hopper, Edward. 1942. Nighthawks. Oil on canvas. Art Institute of Chicago. https://www.artic.edu/artworks/111628.

Citing a figure from a journal article or book

If you reproduce a figure or table from a published paper, cite the source paper in your reference list, and add an attribution line under the figure: Adapted from or Reprinted from, plus the citation.

APA — Figure adapted from a paper

Figure 2
Predicted vs. observed temperature anomalies
Note. Adapted from "Detection and attribution of climate change," by IPCC, 2021, in AR6 Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis (Figure 3.4, p. 451). Copyright 2021 by IPCC.

Permission may be required. Many copyrighted figures require explicit permission from the publisher before reproduction in a thesis or article. Check the publisher's permissions page; many provide free academic-use licensing.

Museum vs. online — when do you need both?

If the image lives in a museum collection but you found it online, cite the museum as the location and add the URL where you found the digital reproduction. The museum holds the original; the URL records your access path.

Public domain and Creative Commons images

Public-domain images and Creative Commons-licensed images still require citation — public domain affects copyright, not attribution. Include the license type when known: CC BY 4.0, CC BY-NC 2.0, etc.

APA — Creative Commons image

Doe, J. (2023). Cherry blossoms in Kyoto [Photograph]. Flickr. https://flickr.com/... CC BY 2.0

Common mistakes

Citing an image only by its URL

A reader needs the artist, title, and date to evaluate the source — not just a link to where it's hosted.

Forgetting the medium

APA and Chicago both expect the medium in square brackets or after the title (oil on canvas, photograph, digital image).

Using "unknown" instead of "untitled"

If a work has no title, write [Untitled] in square brackets — not "Unknown." If the artist is unknown, use the institutional record (e.g., Anonymous or the cataloging name).

Quick reference

Style	Title format	Medium placement
APA 7	Italicized	[Medium] in brackets after title
MLA 9	Italicized	After year, before location
Chicago NB	Italicized	After year in note; on its own in bibliography
Chicago AD	Italicized	After year

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