Rijksmuseum Collection Online

Rijksmuseum brings art and history closer than ever. Explore the Collection Online, collect your personal favourite objects and tell your story in your own Gallery of Honour. 

The Rijksmuseum's collection belongs to everyone. Whether you're a scientist, an art enthusiast, or simply curious, everyone has the right to access the most up-to-date information. That’s why the museum has decided to share as much knowledge and imagery with the world as possible; an overview of 800 years of history, a search through more than 800,000 high-resolution artworks, 500,000 books, and 800 meters of documentation. Art and history are now closer than ever.

Collection online is an adventure. You can lose yourself in the collection by searching for any imaginable topic, endlessly clicking through to the next theme, or letting the Art Explorer’s questions guide you to surprising and remarkable artworks. The goal is to embark on a personal journey of discovery, to collect your own story, and to tell and share your story in your own Gallery of Honour. 

The Art Explorer
The tool is super easy to use, you can fill in every answer you want and will get surprising visual results. The Art Explorer asks questions like ‘What do you love?’, ‘Share your thoughts’, but also more specific questions like ‘What is your favourite sport?’, ‘What is your clothing style?’ or ‘What would your portrait look like?’. You can use the tool as a stepping stone to create your own story. By using the ‘Create’ button you can add your results to a set to your personal Gallery of Honour. 

To connect everything within the collection, a specialized infrastructure has been developed that links various data systems. This was achieved using Linked Open Data, a universal method for releasing structured data into the public domain.

Impact
Since November 27, the site has been live. After the first six weeks, we measured the initial results. We observed that out of the more than 250,000 users since launch, 6,000 accounts have been created by people who started their own Gallery of Honour.

It's great to see that a significant portion of these accounts were created by international users; 55% compared to 45% from the Netherlands. The number of new accounts grows by approximately 725 per week. On average, visitors spend 4.14 minutes in the Collection Online.

Collection Online is an impressive example of how a cultural institution embraces the digital world and democratizes art.