The collection is arranged in six categories:

Original Materials
Motherwell’s papers consist of tens of thousands of documents, including extensive personal and professional correspondence, handwritten manuscripts, drafts of his writings, transcripts of lectures and interviews, studio and business records, datebooks documenting his daily activities, and many other materials.
Original Materials Finding Aid | Highlights

Printed Materials
An extensive collection of exhibition catalogues and announcements, brochures, posters, hundreds of articles related to Motherwell and his work, and other ephemera documenting Motherwell’s long career.
Printed Material Finding Aid | Highlights

Scrapbooks
Motherwell and his studio maintained scrapbooks containing exhibition invitations, brochures and catalogues, reviews and articles, and a small amount of correspondence and other original items. While the materials are similar to those in the Printed Material section of the archive, the scrapbooks are housed separately to retain Motherwell’s original order.
Scrapbooks Finding Aid

Photographs
There are more than 30,000 photographs in the Foundation’s collection.  In addition to images of nearly all of Motherwell’s artworks, there are thousands of exhibition and studio photographs, portraits, slides Motherwell used when he gave lectures, personal photographs of family and friends, and other images.
Photographs Finding Aid | Highlights

Audio and Video Recordings
The Foundation has more than seventy recordings of interviews, conferences, lectures, documentary films and television programs that relate to Motherwell.
Audio and Video Recordings Finding Aid | Highlights

Library
The Dedalus Foundation library contains approximately 3,200 books and more than 1,000 periodicals. While the primary focus of the library is modern art, it also contains substantial holdings in literature, criticism, poetry, and philosophy. Many of the books are inscribed and annotated by Motherwell.