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MoMA Will Make Thousands of Exhibition Images Available Online

76 points by prismatic 10y ago

minimaxir 10y ago
The dataset of all MoMA exhibition metadata is already public (https://github.com/MuseumofModernArt/collection https://github.com/MuseumofModernArt/collection) so this is a logical progression.
douche 10y ago
They should.
lacker 10y ago
Finally, pg's original startup vision of putting art museums online is achieved!
- eitally 10y ago
  https://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/ https://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/
themartorana 10y ago
This is the dream of the internet making culture available to the masses. I've loved Google Art Project for a while, and news of more art coming online is fantastic. My wife is an art teacher and this kind of news makes her giddy.
- jdavis703 10y ago
  Aren't museums open to the masses already? For example I was at the Louvre about a year ago and shocked at the casualness that tourists touched hundreds of years old objects with -- even when these objects had do not touch signs on them. What scares me is that our culture will wind up in the homes and offices of the wealth, truly hidden away from the masses. Seeing the way some museums "guard" their art, I'm really surprised donors still let us mere mortals breathe on their million dollar investments.
  - sehr 10y ago
    The masses cannot afford trips to Paris.
    - jdavis703 10y ago
      There are also masses in Europe. About 500 million I believe, and regardless there are art museums near almost everyone in all developed countries.
      - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
        Well, ignoring the half of many countries that don't live in cities. Can less-than-half be called 'almost everyone'?
      - JadeNB 10y ago
        Even if there is an art museum near you, there may not be the art museum that hosts the particular piece of art that will change your life. Your comment sounds to me like it opposes making as much work as possible available to as many people as possible, which surely isn't what you meant.
      - sehr 10y ago
        The masses do not live in Europe, the masses do not live in developed countries.
kldaace 10y ago
It's great that they're making these available, but I hope people don't use this as a substitute for actually going to the museum. Art is something best experienced in person. While a Jackson Pollock seems ridiculous on a computer screen, its scale and grandeur are something else in person.
- ollifi 10y ago
  Also I hope people who go to museum would refrain from photographing and actually enjoy the art experience while there. MoMa especially was very bad in this regard and it was very difficult to look at anything and not be asked to move out of way. Some museums ban photography and I think it makes them much more enjoyable.
draw_down 10y ago
Good idea, guys.
accomplice 10y ago
I guess 15 years too late is better than never.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
markingram 10y ago
Cool, they should use HoloLens or VR to do a 3D virtual show room. Something like this would be nice: https://m.reddit.com/r/HoloLens/comments/53lfmt/someone_created_a_mini_model_of_his_living_room/ https://m.reddit.com/r/HoloLens/comments/53lfmt/someone_crea...
- rikvanmechelen 10y ago
  I know right! I have in my space time actually played around with something similar for this project, and at least for some exhibitions this is something that could be done in the future. Maybe some next incarnation might include this ;) ps: For full disclosure, I'm one of the Devs that worked on this project though these opinions are completely my own
anotheryou 10y ago
Where can I find the images? All I see are tiny photographs of the exhibition space. http://moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/1220/installation_images/37?locale=en http://moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/1220/installation_image... I hoped for each artwork having a deep-zoom, clean, frontal photograph with optional banana/human/car for scale. Film and Sound would lend itself even better to the internet. (see http://www.ubuweb.com/ http://www.ubuweb.com/ ) edit: ok, found some. 2000px max, obtrusive viewer (that red close button on the image, ugh) without zoom (just some semi-fullscreen) : http://moma.org/collection/works/192537?locale=en http://moma.org/collection/works/192537?locale=en How to do it right (try both, "view in room" and zoom: https://www.artsy.net/artwork/antonio-ballester-moreno-the-shapes-of-letters-1 https://www.artsy.net/artwork/antonio-ballester-moreno-the-s... And of course no sound/video, would probably be too good for us or something...
- rikvanmechelen 10y ago
  Hi anotheryou, For full disclosure, I'm one of the Devs that worked on this project though these opinions are completely my own. We agree that the ugly red X is ugly, it's just part of an old design, that will still be around for a bit, but not too long. We actually used to have a zoom, the problem is that unlike Artsy, we do not have the full rights for these images, even though MoMA might own the artwork. Image rights for modern art are complex, and we removed it not to long ago. We legally can't put out images larger than 2000x2000, so we decided to use tiling to get around that. That was until people started to paste them back together and got a very high res image, so we took it down (for now). In the end, this was an archives project, which means dealing with a lot of old material. We are the first (or at least one of) that opens up our archives in such a way. And as it should be with big IT projects, this was an MVP of course. I really wish I could have been there to take a picture with Audrey Hepburn and a banana for scale :D
  - anotheryou 10y ago
    Thanks for the personal reply. Of course I'm glad you made the effort and it's amazing so much has made it online after all. I suspected rights where an issue and part of my critic was based on the anger about the protective art world in general (I really love the open internet and the art world makes it very hard to share and debate it online).

76 points by prismatic 10y ago

The dataset of all MoMA exhibition metadata is already public (https://github.com/MuseumofModernArt/collection https://github.com/MuseumofModernArt/collection) so this is a logical progression.

douche 10y ago

They should.

lacker 10y ago

Finally, pg's original startup vision of putting art museums online is achieved!

eitally 10y ago
https://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/ https://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/

themartorana 10y ago

This is the dream of the internet making culture available to the masses. I've loved Google Art Project for a while, and news of more art coming online is fantastic. My wife is an art teacher and this kind of news makes her giddy.

jdavis703 10y ago
Aren't museums open to the masses already? For example I was at the Louvre about a year ago and shocked at the casualness that tourists touched hundreds of years old objects with -- even when these objects had do not touch signs on them. What scares me is that our culture will wind up in the homes and offices of the wealth, truly hidden away from the masses. Seeing the way some museums "guard" their art, I'm really surprised donors still let us mere mortals breathe on their million dollar investments.
- sehr 10y ago
  The masses cannot afford trips to Paris.
  - jdavis703 10y ago
    There are also masses in Europe. About 500 million I believe, and regardless there are art museums near almost everyone in all developed countries.
    - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
      Well, ignoring the half of many countries that don't live in cities. Can less-than-half be called 'almost everyone'?
    - JadeNB 10y ago
      Even if there is an art museum near you, there may not be the art museum that hosts the particular piece of art that will change your life. Your comment sounds to me like it opposes making as much work as possible available to as many people as possible, which surely isn't what you meant.
    - sehr 10y ago
      The masses do not live in Europe, the masses do not live in developed countries.

kldaace 10y ago

It's great that they're making these available, but I hope people don't use this as a substitute for actually going to the museum. Art is something best experienced in person. While a Jackson Pollock seems ridiculous on a computer screen, its scale and grandeur are something else in person.

ollifi 10y ago
Also I hope people who go to museum would refrain from photographing and actually enjoy the art experience while there. MoMa especially was very bad in this regard and it was very difficult to look at anything and not be asked to move out of way. Some museums ban photography and I think it makes them much more enjoyable.

draw_down 10y ago

Good idea, guys.

accomplice 10y ago

I guess 15 years too late is better than never.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

markingram 10y ago

Cool, they should use HoloLens or VR to do a 3D virtual show room. Something like this would be nice: https://m.reddit.com/r/HoloLens/comments/53lfmt/someone_created_a_mini_model_of_his_living_room/ https://m.reddit.com/r/HoloLens/comments/53lfmt/someone_crea...

rikvanmechelen 10y ago
I know right! I have in my space time actually played around with something similar for this project, and at least for some exhibitions this is something that could be done in the future. Maybe some next incarnation might include this ;) ps: For full disclosure, I'm one of the Devs that worked on this project though these opinions are completely my own

anotheryou 10y ago

Where can I find the images? All I see are tiny photographs of the exhibition space. http://moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/1220/installation_images/37?locale=en http://moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/1220/installation_image... I hoped for each artwork having a deep-zoom, clean, frontal photograph with optional banana/human/car for scale. Film and Sound would lend itself even better to the internet. (see http://www.ubuweb.com/ http://www.ubuweb.com/ ) edit: ok, found some. 2000px max, obtrusive viewer (that red close button on the image, ugh) without zoom (just some semi-fullscreen) : http://moma.org/collection/works/192537?locale=en http://moma.org/collection/works/192537?locale=en How to do it right (try both, "view in room" and zoom: https://www.artsy.net/artwork/antonio-ballester-moreno-the-shapes-of-letters-1 https://www.artsy.net/artwork/antonio-ballester-moreno-the-s... And of course no sound/video, would probably be too good for us or something...

rikvanmechelen 10y ago
Hi anotheryou, For full disclosure, I'm one of the Devs that worked on this project though these opinions are completely my own. We agree that the ugly red X is ugly, it's just part of an old design, that will still be around for a bit, but not too long. We actually used to have a zoom, the problem is that unlike Artsy, we do not have the full rights for these images, even though MoMA might own the artwork. Image rights for modern art are complex, and we removed it not to long ago. We legally can't put out images larger than 2000x2000, so we decided to use tiling to get around that. That was until people started to paste them back together and got a very high res image, so we took it down (for now). In the end, this was an archives project, which means dealing with a lot of old material. We are the first (or at least one of) that opens up our archives in such a way. And as it should be with big IT projects, this was an MVP of course. I really wish I could have been there to take a picture with Audrey Hepburn and a banana for scale :D
- anotheryou 10y ago
  Thanks for the personal reply. Of course I'm glad you made the effort and it's amazing so much has made it online after all. I suspected rights where an issue and part of my critic was based on the anger about the protective art world in general (I really love the open internet and the art world makes it very hard to share and debate it online).