Google recruits museum

The Jinshan Site Museum in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, has became the second Chinese museum to join the Google Art Project, the Art Newspaper said. It will display 81 items online, including the gold foil Sun God Bird, a typical handicraft from the Jinsha culture (1200BC-650BC).

The project has also collected works of art from the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Tate Gallery in London. However, some art critics question the value of online exhibits, in which people can enlarge works to brush-stroke levels of resolution, or dismember the works of arts into components.

They worry it will change the habits of art lovers, making going to museums less frequent. The first Chinese participant in the project is the Hunan Provincial Museum.