Metropolitan Museum Launches New Interactive Web Feature One Met. Many Worlds. in 11 Languages Visitors Can Explore More Than 500 Works of Art from the Museum’s World-Renowned Collection

Web address: www.metmuseum.org/one-met-many-worlds

Thomas P. Campbell, Director and CEO of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, announced today the launch of One Met. Many Worlds., a new interactive feature that is presented in 11 languages on the Museum’s website.

One Met. Many Worlds. allows visitors to explore more than 500 highlights from the Museum’s encyclopedic collection in English, Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish. Through details of individual works of art linked to universal themes and concepts, One Met. Many Worlds. also invites visitors to respond by pairing images playfully, poetically, and creatively.

Mr. Campbell said, in making the announcement: “One Met. Many Worlds. is another groundbreaking digital tool for experiencing the Museum’s collection. Its foundation is our exceptional scholarship, but it also encourages our audiences to play and explore. This is the first of what I hope will be many multi-lingual approaches to the Met as we strive to reflect the cultures represented in our collection.”

One Met. Many Worlds. is made possible by Bloomberg.

The new feature builds on a series of award-winning Metropolitan Museum initiatives online that are inspired by the Museum's vast collection. The Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, launched in 2000, continues to evolve and expand, and receives more than one million visits per month. Connections(2011) offers personal perspectives on works of art in the collection by 100 members of the Museum's staff. 82nd & Fifth (2013) features 100 curators from across the Met who talk about 100 works of art from the collection that changed the way they see the world—one work, one curator, two minutes at a time. And MetCollects (2014) offers first looks at works of art acquired recently by the Museum. One Met. Many Worlds. is the fifth of these collection-inspired Metropolitan Museum online features.

One Met. Many Worlds. takes an innovative approach to the collection. By presenting individual works of art with curatorial descriptions alongside thematic groupings of image details, the web feature incorporates the voices of both the Met's experts and its audiences. Visitors can leave their mark by offering witty, smart, and thoughtful pairings of images, sharing their creations, and posting them on the One Met. Many Worlds. visitor gallery. They can engage with this content equally in English and in 10 additional languages.

One Met. Many Worlds. is based on and inspired by The Metropolitan Museum of Art Guide, first published by the Museum in English in 2012. Other print editions in Chinese, French, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, and Spanish followed in 2013, and they can be ordered—as well as new editions to be printed in Arabic, German, Korean, and Russian in late June—athttp://store.metmuseum.org/met-publications/the-metropolitan-museum-of-art-guide/invt/mmanewguide. 

Also forthcoming in late June is the Kindle edition of the Guide, which can be pre-ordered on Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/Metropolitan-Museum-Art-Guide-ebook/dp/B00KQ0H9Z8/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=8-1&qid=1401994372. 

One Met. Many Worlds. is produced by the Metropolitan Museum’s Digital Media Department in collaboration with CHIPS, the Editorial Department, The Photograph Studio, and curatorial staff of The Metropolitan Museum of Art.