The Google Cultural Institute has partnered with 10 new art and cultural institutions in India to share its incredible heritage with the world. By Rupinder Kaur
The Metropolitan Museum of Arts in New York City or the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg will be on every art enthusiast’s must-explore list. The visuals of numerous artworks by renowned artists we’ve explored on the internet but the minute details, we tell ourselves, can only be examined when we will be present in front of the magnificent work of art.
But what if you could have complete access to an artwork’s details with a simple click of a button on your computers or smartphoneIJ For example, Netherlandish Renaissance artist Pieter Brueghel the Elder’s painting called The Harvester (1565) has been displayed at The Met in NYC and has been called the “first modern landscape”. The focus of the work is on the farmers. While some sit under the tree munching on bread or porridge, others work in the fields harvesting wheat. When one looks closely, they can spot a few people in the backdrop. With Google Cultural Institute’s feature of zooming-in, one can see the bizarre game of goose pulling being played on Shrove Tuesday by the country folk. This is what we would call revolutionary technology.
“The idea here is that by using special hardware and cameras, we are trying to capture these images like they have never been seen before. On the internet, the users want to interact with the images, they want to zoom in and play with it,” shared Amit Sood, Director of Google Cultural Institute, which started its operations in India in 2012 with National Gallery of Modern Art as its first partner. The Institute, with an aim to make art and culture a part of everyday life, has joined hands with 10 institutions in India including Salar Jung Museum, Victoria Memorial Hall, Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centres and Ashrams, et al. With this association, 70 new exhibitions and 2,000 artifacts have been added to their existing online content in order to digitise and share India’s rich heritage with the rest of the world.
Rajan Anandan, Vice President and Managing Director of Google (South East Asia and India), at the event of launching new online content, spoke about democratising information including access to culture, history and art. Mahesh Sharma, Minister of State of Tourism and Culture (Independent Charge) and Civil Aviation was also present on the occasion.
“The internet is transforming our lives in more ways than one. India already has over 300 million internet users and we are adding six million users every single month. At the current pace of growth, by 2017 we’ll have 500 million Indians on the internet. Even today with 300 million users online, which is only 25 per cent of India’s population. A student in a village school just by having access to computing device or maybe a smartphone can now access huge amount of information about the incredible culture, history and heritage. The internet has created a very bright future for India, but technology is not just for the future or even for the present, the Google Cultural Institute team has embarked on using the internet to bring to life, to preserve and to distribute globally — the past,” Anandan shared.
A country with world’s second largest population and 5,000 years of history, which is rich in cultural diversity, languages, art, et al. can be preserved, enriched and shared with the rest of the world via this platform and even mobile apps. “Our focus this year has been to bring new content around topics which have great Indian history like yoga, crafts, et al. We have nine new institutions, 70 exhibitions, over 2,000 new items and 25 new street view collects. These are expert curators sharing best of India’s heritage with the world. We also want to reach users everywhere, on every platform and today we live in a mobile world. They are launching special mobile apps and content that will be now accessible not only on the websites but also on mobile apps,” he informed.
Amit Sood underlined that the idea behind the initiative was to build technology that museums, archives and foundations can use to connect to audiences across the world.
“We focus on art, history and wonders. Our job is to help people discover millions of artworks and tell stories about those works. We are not just interested in looking at an image but also understanding what is behind it,” he said.
Globally, the Institute has over 850 museums, archives and foundations working with it in over 60 countries. “We are really getting a world view of art, history and wonders. Over 6.4 million artifacts are now part of the Cultural Institute. All these are great numbers but at the end of the day, what is really magical is when you see the reaction of the people. I went to a school in london and demonstrated the exhibition we did with the Archeological Survey of India around Taj Mahal. These students had never been to India and it was a phenomenal experience to see how they connect so fast and now wish to travel here,” Sood added.
Taking us on a tour of the content, Sood showcased some of his favourite exhibits, including one on world-renowned yoga exponent BKS Iyengar where one can view never seen before photographs.
After Italy and France, India has joined the craft section as well. One can view the exhibit by Dastkari Haat Samiti called Akshara. “We’ve also been working on presenting the craftwork from the northern region of India. One can zoom into the pictures and know about the craftsmen and how they develop their work,” he said while adding some exhibits like one from National Museum called Alamkara — The Beauty of Ornament, helps him lure people towards art and craft.
“So I ask them if they like gold,” he laughed. “I tell people that this is how I get people engaged in what I do. My mum doesn’t really care about what I work on until I told her we have a lot of good gold. We have 1,800 gold objects from 60 countries and now she goes and selects designs for her own collection”.
They are also offering institutions in the world to develop a mobile application without any cost involved and publish it in the Playstore for free. “This is not branded as a Google app but a mobile app of the museum built with Google technology. We have launched the pilot in India with four partners. Globally 50 museums have launched the apps. They are not wasting their IT budgets building apps but actually using it for curation,” Sood informed.