OpenGlyph — Catalogue of the American Public DomainJurisdiction: United StatesRev. 2026.08
Images / art

Two archives, queried live.

Every record below comes from The Met or Smithsonian Open Access and was filtered on that archive’s own rights field before it reached this page. 13 shown for “Bendix Gijsen” — 41 records examined, 26 dropped by the rights gate.

Archives queried 2026-08-27 20:54 UTC · fetched live for this request

Object
Public domainThe Met’s isPublicDomain field is true for this object.
CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian’s metadata_usage.access reads CC0 — a waiver, not an expired term.
Not shownAnything failing its archive’s rights field is dropped server-side and never appears here.
Sugar bowl and spoons, by Bendix Gijsen

Sugar bowl and spoons

Bendix Gijsen · 1804

Public domainThe Met
Model, Static, Wedell-Williams #44

Model, Static, Wedell-Williams #44

Artist not stated in the record · 1978

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Aeshna mutata

Aeshna mutata

Artist not stated in the record · 30 May 1986

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Plathemis lydia

Plathemis lydia

Artist not stated in the record · 9 May 1985

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Plathemis lydia

Plathemis lydia

Artist not stated in the record · 9 May 1985

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Lestes rectangularis

Lestes rectangularis

Artist not stated in the record · 23 Jul 1985

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Carex hirtifolia Mack.

Carex hirtifolia Mack.

Artist not stated in the record · 27 May 1991

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Campyloneurum phyllitidis (L.) C. Presl

Campyloneurum phyllitidis (L.) C. Presl

Artist not stated in the record · Transcribed d/m/y: 24/1/62

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Lomariopsis prieuriana Fée

Lomariopsis prieuriana Fée

Artist not stated in the record · Transcribed d/m/y: 1/2/62

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Selaginella haematodes (Kunze) Spring

Selaginella haematodes (Kunze) Spring

Artist not stated in the record · Transcribed d/m/y: 24/1/62

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Selaginella arthritica Alston

Selaginella arthritica Alston

Artist not stated in the record · Transcribed d/m/y: 21/1/62

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Lomariopsis vestita E. Fourn.

Lomariopsis vestita E. Fourn.

Artist not stated in the record · Transcribed d/m/y: 1/2/62

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Didymoglossum curtii (Rosenst.) Pic. Serm.

Didymoglossum curtii (Rosenst.) Pic. Serm.

Artist not stated in the record · Transcribed d/m/y: 29/1/62

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
What was queried

Where these records came from.

Two archives are wired, and only two. Each one is filtered on its own rights field — never on a title match, and never on the presence of an image file.

  • The Met Collection API (Open Access)Rights field: isPublicDomain. 1 matched · 1 examined · 0 dropped by the rights gate. Kept only where isPublicDomain === true and a file URL was published.1 shown
  • Smithsonian Open Access API (api.si.edu)Rights field: content.descriptiveNonRepeating.metadata_usage.access. 81 matched · 40 examined · 26 dropped by the rights gate. Kept only where metadata_usage.access === "CC0" and an image resource was published.12 shown

These figures describe the pass run at 2026-08-27 20:54 UTC, during this request. A completed pass is kept for 24 hours and replayed for an identical search, which is what keeps repeated queries inside Smithsonian’s 30-requests-per-hour allowance. A pass in which either archive failed to answer is never kept — an outage must not be replayed as though it were a finding about the catalogue.

Wikimedia Commons and the Library of Congress are deliberately not wired. Wikimedia was confirmed, on a live query, to return CC-BY material inside the same result set as genuine public domain works, and filtering it safely has not been designed yet. loc.gov was blocked by bot detection during the source evaluation, so its rights vocabulary has never been observed — and nothing here is built on a field nobody has read.

An image file is a rights claim. It never travels without its field.