Virtual Art Galleries

The Metropolitan Museum of Art


The Metropolitan Museum of Art is the largest art gallery in the United States. It has over two million works of art in its permanent collection.

The Met 360° Project is a series of six 360° movies which allow you to explore the museum and some of its galleries. The videos include tours of the Great Hall, the Met Cloisters and the Charles Engelhard Court. As each video plays you can pan around 360°, just like you can in Google Maps Street View.


The National Gallery


London's National Gallery is home to over 2,300 paintings including many masterpieces such as Van Gogh's Sunflowers and Leonardo da Vinci's The Virgin of the Rocks. The National Gallery's virtual tours allow you to explore the Sainsbury Wing in VR, explore 18 of the museum's galleries (featuring 300 separate paintings) and explore the museum yourself using Google Maps Street View.


The Rijksmuseum Masterpieces Up Close


Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum has a collection of over 1 million paintings and other objects. Using the Rijksmuseum Masterpieces Up Close website you can take a virtual walk around the museum's Gallery of Honour. The Gallery of Honour is a long gallery which is headed at one end by Rembrandt's The Night Watch. The side alcoves (running down both sides of the gallery) feature a number of other Dutch masterpieces by the great artists of the seventeenth century.

The Soane Museum
The Sir John Soane Museum is one of London's most interesting museums. The museum is in the home of the 19th century neo-classical architect John Soane and contains many of his drawings and models. It also contains many examples from his huge collection of paintings and antiquities.

The Sir John Soane Museum website has an outstanding 3D map which allows you to explore two of the museum's rooms in virtual reality. The map is an incredible interactive 3D model of the complete home of Sir John Soane. The interactive allows you to fly through the museum in 3D and explore the exhibits in the two rooms in very close detail.


You might also enjoy these other virtual museum tours:

The Sistine Chapel Virtual Tour - explore the Sistine Chapel and Michelangelo's astonishing ceiling
The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural Museum - has created a number of virtual tours
The Stonehenge Virtual Tour - places you in the center of this mysterious pre-historic monument
Louis XIV's Palace of Versailles can be explored in this Google Arts and Culture tour