The world’s largest art museum has digitized more than 400,000 of its collections and now you can visit the Paris historic monument without booking a plane ticket.
In a statement obtained by NPR, the Louvre Museum announced on Friday that it has placed its massive art pieces on display online.
“The Louvre is dusting off its treasures, even the least-known,” said Jean-Luc Martinez, President-Director of the Musée du Louvre, in the March 26 statement.“For the first time, anyone can access the entire collection of works from a computer or smartphone for free, whether they are on display in the museum, on loan, even long-term, or in storage.”
According to the Louvre, the searchable Collections Database contains entries for over 480,000 words from the museum. The database is updated on a daily basis and comes as the result of constant research and documentation efforts conducted by expert teams from the Louvre and the National Museum of Eugene Delacroix.
Luxury lifestyle magazine Robb Report noted that the Louvre has also given its website a makeover allowing it to provide improved support to the museum, which has pivoted to digital efforts ever since October 2020. It’s been closed to in-person visitors for five months.
“The Louvre’s stunning cultural heritage is all now just a click away!” Martinez said in the statement, which Robb Report also obtained. “I am sure that this digital content is going to further inspire people to come to the Louvre to discover the collections in person.”
In the meantime, virtual Louvre guests can use their desktops, smartphones or tablets to glimpse pieces from the museum’s eight departments. Doing so will allow them to feast their eyes on everything from Egyptian artifacts to Renaissance statues.
While the museum is closed in real life, Associated Press reported it is getting a facelift, having gone from 30,000 to 40,000 visitors daily to none.
“We’re taking advantage of the museum’s closure to carry out a number of major works, speed up maintenance operations and start repair works that are difficult to schedule when the museum is operating normally,” Laurent le Guedart, the Louvre’s Architectural Heritage and Gardens Director told AP.
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