Top 5 Virtual Museums and Art Galleries
Need an art fix during lock-down? We’ve got you covered…
At the time of writing the length of the Covid-19 lock-down is unknown. It has been a stressful and anxiety-inducing period for so many people. One of the hardest things is that many of the places people go to unwind and refresh their souls during times of stress are closed, including art galleries and museums. Many galleries have impressive virtual presences though which are improving in quality and now so crucial. We’ve selected some of the best places who have their virtual experience rocking.
Wishing you all health and happiness,
The Team at Artienda
What is a virtual art gallery?
A virtual art gallery is much more than just a website featuring images of an artist’s artwork. When produced with impact and skill, it should be a fully interactive and immersive digital experience. In 2011, Google launched its Arts & Culture product which aims to provide a huge online catalogue for much of the art that exists today. They have since partnered with many museums and galleries across the world. As well as featuring collections of artwork viewable as a standard gallery of online images they have also brought in ‘Museum view’ which works in a similar way to Google Street View giving a full 3D image of the space inside a gallery. Many galleries have also produced their own interactive versions of the experience they offer.
1. Musee d’Orsay, Paris
Collection themes:
This museum holds mainly French art dating from 1848 to 1914, including paintings, sculptures, furniture, and photography. It houses the largest collection of impressionist and post-impressionist masterpieces in the world, by painters including Monet, Manet, Degas, Renoir, Cezanne, Seurat, Sisley, Gaugin, and Van Gogh.
Why it’s cool:
Under its 138m-long curved glass roof - in the former Gare d’Orsay, a Paris railway station and hotel - sits the largest collection of impressionist and post-Impressionist works in the world. The gallery’s profile on Google Arts & Culture has a fantastic collection of 278 artworks and a ‘Museum View’ as well. The virtual tour also includes an online exhibition charting the history of the building. On Tourist Tube there’s a 360-degree view of the magnificent exterior.
Gallery website:
Click here for the official Musee d’Orsay website.
2. MASP, Sao Paulo
Collection themes:
The Museu de Arte de São Paulo in Brazil has one of the broadest historical collections available to view via its virtual gallery platform, spanning from the 14th to 20th centuries. Paintings appear suspended in the air around the open-plan space, on glass panels or “crystal easels” as the museum calls them.
Why it’s cool:
There’s a temporary retrospective exhibition by Brazilian pop artist Teresinha Soares beside the building’s statement red staircase. The glass and red-beam structure, built in 1968, is worth a look from the outside too, via Google Street View.
Gallery website: Click here for the official, and beautifully designed, MASP website.
3. Vatican Museums, Rome
Collection themes:
With soaring vaulted ceilings and intricate murals and tapestries, the Vatican’s museums are definitely worth a look. Don’t forget to look up when exploring the seven spaces in the museum’s virtual tour, to gawp at a series of 360-degree images, including the Sistine Chapel. Wander around the rest of the Vatican museums with these 360 tours that take in Saint Peter’s Basilica and Square, complete with a tour guide narrating each interactive space.
Why it’s cool:
It is believed that Vatican Museums contain the world's largest collection of art with 9 miles of pieces, which could wrap four and half times around the Vatican walls. The Vatican museums are a series of 1,400 rooms, chapels, and galleries that constitute former wings of the Vatican Palace.
Gallery website:
Click here for the official Vatican Museums website.
4. Guggenheim, Bilbao
Collection themes:
The interactive tour provided by Google takes viewers around its collection of postwar American and European painting and sculpture – Rothko, Holzer, Koons, Kapoor – and even down between the weathered curves of Serra’s Matter of Time (turn left at the entrance).
Why it’s cool:
Frank Gehry’s sculptured titanium and steel building, on the banks of the Nervión River, is one of the world’s most distinctive art spaces.
Gallery website:
Click here for the official Guggenheim website.
5. British Museum, London
Collection themes: Within this magnificent space, visitors can find the Rosetta Stone, Egyptian mummies, and other ancient wonders. The museum’s interactive infographic platform, History Connected, goes into further depth of various objects with curators, along a timeline.
Why it’s cool: There are no fewer than 3,212 panes of glass in the domed ceiling of the British Museum’s Great Court, and no two are the same!
Museum website: Click here for the official British Museum website.
