Multimedia Multimedia

"The presence of Versailles in the Google Art Project from the origin of the project has created widespread interest in the remote consultation of our collections. A key advantage for the virtual visitor is to be able to view the art works in their context, thanks to the Street View technology: they take on their full meaning in the setting of the royal Grand Apartments and the Hall of Mirrors."
Catherine Pégard, Chairman of the Public Establishment of the palace, museum and national estate of Versailles.

As a stakeholder alongside 17 other institutions for the first phase of the Google Art Project (which went online in February 2011), the palace of Versailles then digitised new materials for the second phase, ending in April 2012.

Thanks to the Google Street View technology, a very vast audience can now pay virtual visits to the Grand Apartments and the Hall of Mirrors to discover their historical paintings, decoration and ceilings. In 2009, this technology enabled the palace to propose a virtual visit to the gardens of Versailles.

Thirty works have also been digitised in high definition, including the celebrated Meal in the House of Simon the Pharisee by Veronese, the Coronation of the Emperor Napoleon I by Jacques Louis David, and the painted ceiling of the Hall of Mirrors by Charles Le Brun. One work has also been digitised in very high definition, the painting depicting Marie-Antoinette de Lorraine-Hasbourg, queen of France and her children, painted by Elizabeth Vigée-Lebrun.