Googling Madrid's Prado
We saw the AP feed about Google Earth teaming up with the Prado Museum which allows
any of us to look at some of the museum's paintings with a zoom lens. According to the report, this is a first for Google and an art museum. So, we decided to do our own search and let you see what we found. First, you have to download the Google Earth software. Now, just type in "Prado Museum, Madrid" in the search/fly to box and watch as Google takes you to Madrid. Once you hover of the building just hit on the museum's little window box, click, and in you go. We got to the Masterpieces' page where there were 14 paintings from the museum's collection. We clicked on Goya's, The 3rd of May, 1808, Madrid.
This window popped-up over the Google map, and when we clicked on the painting, a new
window opened up featuring the artwork with the zoom tool.
So, we zoomed away and got closer to the surface than we would ever have gotten -
unless maybe, as a conservator. The clarity was amazing, and I have to admit, it was wonderful moving deeper and deeper into the painting.
How does all this technology advance the study and appreciation of art? Well, I'm not sure.
Making art available to more and more people is a good thing. Is the Internet the best way for any of those people to experience art? That I'm not so sure about. Is there any purpose being served by zooming in so closely to a painting that you can see the smallest detail in the tiniest brush stroke? I found it enlightening because I love painting, and seeing Goya's use of the brush, along with the texture of the paint, helped me in furthering my own personal understanding of the painting's majestic quality. My only fear is, that all this technology will replace the irreplaceable experience of physically seeing a work of art. I will never stop going to museums and galleries just because I can sit on my butt and look at art online. But, I would never have been able to see Goya's masterwork as close-up as I did, without Google Earth.
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