The Kochi-Muziris Biennale 2012, India’s first biennale, has become the first to be archived and digitised by Google Art Project.
The contemporary arts event held at rundown spice warehouses at Kochi for more than three months from December 12 last can now be viewed by the world on the GAP’s website. The GAP is project of Google Cultural Institute that is in partnership with hundreds of museums and archives to world over to host cultural treasures online. Its partners include the Louvre Museum, Paris and the National Gallery, London. This is the first time that GAP has collaborated with a biennale.
With the Kochi-Muziris Biennale featuring on the GAP, viewers can take a virtual tour of Aspinwal House at Fort Kochi, the main venue of the KMB, and 14 other venues to see works of 89 artists from 23 countries that had been showcased. Bose Krishnamachari, co-curator of the KMB notes that even after 20 years from now, someone can experience the biennale exactly as it happened in 2012.
The GAP team had depicted the biennale using special cameras and equipment so that it could be archived online.