The Metropolitan Museum’s new blockchain-powered smartphone game, Art Links is the institution’s newest bid to embrace the cultural currency of gaming.
Designed in collaboration with innovation platform Trlab, the serialized game invites players to identify common threads or “channels” among some 140 artworks across its collection. New demanding situations will be posted every 12 weeks to maximize engagement.
“By combining art from the museum’s collections, from modern and fresco art to Asian and Egyptian art, players can expand their engagement and understanding of culture and creativity in a fun and compelling way. In fact, Art Links exemplifies how the Met continues to link audiences to concepts and to each other while exploring emerging technologies,” said Max Hollein, French director and CEO of the Met, Marina Kellen, in a statement.
“As a company at the forefront of art and technology, we are committed to creating new tactics that allow audiences to discover, interact with, and immerse themselves in art and culture,” added Audrey Or, co-founder and CEO of Trlab. “Our partnership with the MET for its first experience on the Internet reflects our conviction that deepening the bonds between creators, creditors and enthusiasts is the future of art. We combine virtual innovation with artistic expression to create truly transformative experiences.
TRLAB’s notable collaborations come with “The Calder Question,” a multi-season educational endeavor evolved with the Calder Foundation;
Each channel includes at least one piece of the art collection of the twentieth and twenty -centuries of Themet and, at the same time, highlights the works in a broader artistic context.
The game features four types of connections: “Highlights,” showcasing key works, artists, or movements; “Material,” focusing on how works are made; “Emojis,” highlighting signs, symbols, and visual culture; and “Web3,” showing how artists across time have engaged with core concepts underpinning blockchain, such as randomization, security and ledgers.
Themes include: “Art x Tech,” with paintings addressing artists’ discussion of technological innovation over time, adding The 49 States by Matthew Jensen; and “Harlem as Muse,” which features artists who have been inspired by Harlem, as well as Romare Bearden and Faith Ringgold, whose paintings appeared in a recent Dior Couture show.
The game also presents more education moments in which players can be informed more about specific works and artists.
Built with accessibility in mind, it uses screen reader friendly code along with visual descriptions of all in-game artwork and imagery which were developed in partnership with The Met’s Access team.
In the game, players create a chain that is made up of seven works of art and six connections. Connections can be words, emojis or works. The chain is finished in 3 circles, with a progressively harder circular fit.
Players can collect a maximum of 12 free badges, one from each weekly chain, with opportunities to earn seven achievements linked to in game challenges. Five of the achievement tokens are free, while two tokens can be purchased “at an affordable price.”
Players can collect NFT badges and win physical experiences and digital rewards from exhibition catalogues and store discounts to private, curator led tours.
In 2023, the MET joined Roblox in an app based on the search for augmented truth associated with an experience on the gaming platform. Created with technology partner Verizon, it guided visitors with an interactive card to 37 selected works of art, which they can easily import to their Roblox profile. Later that year, the British Museum announced an experience on blockchain gaming platform, The Sandbox, that year.
That this new initiative remains anchored firmly on a Met owned platform, though, is telling. Gaming has proven itself a powerful tool for engagement so it makes sense to optimize its value, retaining its users rather than sending them elsewhere. NARS did similar in September when it launched Maison Explicit, an immersive virtual commerce experience on its own website.
Art Links is based on Coinbase’s Etherium Base L2 blockchain and accepts cryptocurrencies and Bills MoonPay and Stripe credits.
While no longer perhaps the innovation du jour, as it continues to converge with other technologies and ignited by the Bitcoin hike, blockchain is coming of age and experiencing a resurgence, not least for its value in securing real world assets in conjunction with Artificial Intelligence.
Likewise, when it is connected to games and lasting games as a cultural currency. As technologies converge, they can only become more powerful.
artlinks. metmuseum. org