While much of the world waits for a safer time to visit their favorite museums, one museum is thriving without the bustle of in-person visitors: the Infinite Art Museum.
Located entirely online, the Infinite Art Museum boasts a variety of fascinating exhibits from digital artists and creators around the world. While it launched as a Steam app in 2019, it has now expanded to virtual reality where visitors can peek at multimedia of numerous styles with just the click of a mouse.
The Infinite Art Museum could be described as an online gallery, but the designs offer so much more. Once inside, it is made to feel as if you are walking through an actual museum: there are walls designed to bestow the virtual creations and winding hallways to take you to the next room.
Nigel Fogden is the creator of the Infinite Art Museum. A developer and crypto art collector, he believes that now is the right time to visit, especially in a technological sense. “VR is becoming rapidly cheaper and more accessible. Artists as a group are also very open to experimenting with VR both creatively and as a platform,” he notes.
The IAM really is at its heart a museum and it depends on the willingness of people to be challenged and open.
-Nigel Fogden, creator
While the Infinite Art Museum offers a collection smaller than places like The Met or The Art Institute of Chicago, the content is by no means lacking. Each artist has created an enchanting digital world that offers wonder to the eyes and tricks on the mind.
Infinite Art Museum Virtually Fits All Tastes
Hopping around each room, you find something more mind-bending and fascinating than the last: In Hallidonto, a voice-over guides you through the world of a ‘Cyborg iconoclast’, which thrives on poetry and digital painting. Just below, The Natural Wrap offers an environment of serenity and peace to “sharpen your mind, to get inspired in, places to focus on the self and the selflessness of the now”. Next door, a Blockchain exhibit greets you with eye-catching paintings and a futuristic setting.
Pieces in the Infinite Art Museum are often donated or collected, and they can be auctioned off at times. Visitors can check out the crypto art collection for digital purchases.
Encouraging Collaboration
Like all museums, this one is still growing. Artists are encouraged to collaborate with the museum. The official invitation to artists on its website to artists states, “It is our hope that the Infinite Art Museum can help artists connect with their audience in a new way and at the same time preserve their work for the future.”
In an online interview, Fogden explained, “The key to keeping technology open and democratic is having a large number of people who understand it and can create with it.
“I hope that VR follows that path!”
Fogden doesn’t consider himself a gatekeeper either: “I’m excited by the possibilities of using photogrammetry to show sculpture in VR. I’d also love to include calligraphy and interactive art installations.”
I’d just like people to know that designing in VR isn’t that hard! I’m not special and anyone can do it with a little study and practice.
-Nigel Fogden
As lockdowns linger and art exhibitions remain closed, a place like the Infinite Art Museum is the right place to go: it allows for the indulgence of new forms of art, free to the public, and accessible during a time where many venues for the arts are not open. That is why the Infinite Art Museum offers so much to a visitor during a pandemic.
Fogden offered a message for what is next. “Ultimately I see a future where VR environments are as common and easy as web pages. I’m hoping to help move things in that direction,” he says.
To submit to the Infinite Art Museum: https://infiniteartmuseum.com/submissions/
To collaborate with them: https://infiniteartmuseum.com/collaborate-with-the-iam/
Follow it on Twitter: @infiniteartmuse
