Art on the iPhone

This caught my atten­tion today:

“The Nation­al Gallery is the first ever gallery to make its paint­ings acces­si­ble through a down­load­able iPhone appli­ca­tion, mak­ing it pos­si­ble to take a mini tour of the Gallery any­where in the world.

The Gallery, in part­ner­ship with Anten­na Audio and Apple Inc., has designed a new appli­ca­tion for iPhones and iTouch devices that enables peo­ple to explore a sam­ple of the col­lec­tion while they’re on the move. Designed to appeal to art enthu­si­asts and fans of the Gallery, this appli­ca­tion is the first of its kind to be released by a major gallery.

This Pen­ti­men­to appli­ca­tion, called Love Art (get the free app here), fea­tures 250 paint­ings from the col­lec­tion along with around 200 min­utes of audio and video con­tent, includ­ing inter­views with Nation­al Gallery Direc­tor Dr Nicholas Pen­ny, drama­tist Robin Brooks, artist Mag­gie Ham­bling and Girl with a Pearl Ear­ring author Tra­cy Cheva­lier.

Mak­ing use of spe­cial iPhone fea­tures such as its large touch-screen, zoom, Rolodex and scrol­lable menus, Love Art offers a play­ful explo­ration of the col­lec­tion, togeth­er with infor­ma­tive com­men­taries. The paint­ings are show­cased to the best advan­tage using high-res­o­lu­tion images on the iPhone’s excel­lent-qual­i­ty screen. Due to a tac­tile inter­face the expe­ri­ence gained through this appli­ca­tion is not only high­ly enjoy­able, but also lets you zoom in to see details that are often missed”