According to The New York Times there is a new way for aesthetes to discover  art.  Yesterday’s article, “Online, a Genome Project for the World of Art”  exposed artsy:

“…a start-up whose public version went live on Monday. An extensive free repository of fine-art images and an online art appreciation guide, it is predicated on the idea that audiences comfortable with image-driven Web sites like Tumblr and Pinterest are now primed to spend hours browsing through canvases and sculpture on their monitors and tablets, especially with one-click help.”

…

“But as it extends the platform’s reach, Art.sy also raises questions about how (or if) digital analytics should be applied to visual art. Can algorithms help explain art?”

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“Robert Storr, dean of the Yale University School of Art, has his doubts. “It depends so much on the information, who’s doing the selection, what the criteria are, and what the cultural assumptions behind those criteria are,” Mr. Storr, a former curator of painting and sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, said. In terms of art comprehension, he added, “I’m sure it will be reductive.”

 

Despite kinks, with 275 galleries and 50 museums contributing to the site, you won’t be bored. For example, if you search Picasso, pages and pages of his paintings will appear along with related and contemporary artists influenced by his art. One of the contemporary artists I was introduced to was Francesco Vezzoli, and his piece “Ballets Russes Italian Style (The Shortest Musical You Will Never See Again),” from the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles (2009). Check it out!