Miss art museums? The Louvre has just put its entire art collection online

Written by Alaa Elassar, CNN

There’s nothing like spending a rainy afternoon in a museum enjoying the beauty and wonders of art and history. Now you can do that straight from home at the Louvre, the world’s most visited museum.

The French museum has released an online platform featuring all of the museum’s artworks, consisting of more than 480,000 pieces, the Louvre announced in a press release on Friday.
Art lovers and researchers can now view the Louvre’s entire collection online for free.

The website features works of art from collections of the museum’s eight departments, ranging from Islamic art and Renaissance sculptures to Egyptian antiquities and paintings by artists around the world.

“Today, the Louvre is dusting off its treasures, even the least known,” Jean-Luc Martinez, the Louvre’s president and director, said in a statement. “For the first time, everyone has free access to the entire collection of works from a computer or smartphone, whether they are on display in the museum, on loan, even long-term or in storage.”

“The Louvre’s stunning cultural heritage is now all just a click away!” he added. “I’m sure this digital content will further inspire people to come to the Louvre to discover the collections in person.”

Visitors can search the museum’s vast collections through simple or advanced searches, submissions by curatorial department, or themed albums, the release said.

The website has an interactive map that allows people to explore the museum and all of the artwork room by room.

The website will be regularly updated by museum experts as the museum’s collection slowly grows, the publication said.

Lockdown restrictions due to the coronavirus pandemic closed the Louvre in late October, leaving world-renowned artworks like “Venus de Milo,” “Liberty Leading the People” and the “Mona Lisa” without their usual crowd of admirers.
Although the museum is still closed to visitors, the Louvre is now undergoing long-planned renovations.

Source