Master Pieces: The Curator’s View – iPad App Review
With Master Pieces you can train your “curatorial eye” and learn what makes a masterpiece great while playing fun games and reading Thomas Hoving’s inspired clues and essays. Kids (ages 6 plus) and adults enjoy playing the game and learning (or re-learning) about these works and how to really appreciate the details.
In all honesty we’ve had a difficulty writing this review of Master Pieces: The Curator’s View iPad App. Not for any negative reasons but simply because it is so much fun and so addictive that we haven’t been able to stop playing it in order to write. At last, we have managed to tear ourselves away, so please do enjoy the review below.
Once you have downloaded this game you are presented with the above page. There are three options to choose from, these include Introduction, Games and Gallery.
Introduction
By selecting the Introduction icon you will be taken through an in-depth explanation of the game and how Tom, director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art from 1967 – 1977, wrote Master Pieces with Lori Stein and Kate Learson in 2005 to bring a favorite game of his to the public. It provides a great base from which to launch yourself into the depths of the art world.
Games
The second icon from the main menu is Games. When you select that you are greeted with the three game types of this game. These include Study Then Guess, Match Three Details and Guess The Artist. We will take you through each one.
Study Then Guess
The Study Then Guess game starts with a selection of paintings for you to browse through. Once you have studied them all, select the Start Game icon and you will be taken into the questions. There are six artists names are on the right hand of the screen and at the bottom of the screen three options including Show Painting, Show Hint and Skip. The main area of the screen is taken up with an enlarged portion of an image taken from a painting. So, the idea is to guess who painted the painting.
If you know the answer for sure, just select one of the artists names and then you will be taken to the next question. If you want to see the complete painting to help remind you, just select that option or if you’re still not sure you could select Show Hint. The Show Hint icon gives a little clue about the painting and sometimes more detail of the painter to help steer you in the right direction. By using any of the clues they will deduct from the maximum number of points you can attain per question, which is 10 for a normal question and 14 for a difficult one but then it is better to have a clue and lose a few points than not answer at all.
Match Three Details
The second game expects you to match three details from the same painting out of a selection of twelve. It’s actually trickier than it sounds, but excellent fun and really helps you improve your visual skills. If you are really not sure which squares go together you can choose to Show Painting and this shows the whole thing, giving you additional help, although it will minus 3 points from the total possible of 10 if you choose this option.
Guess The Artist
This is perhaps the hardest level of the three. The objective is to see how many randomly selected details you can identify from the catalog of 54 masterpieces. It’s similar to Study Then Guess except you don’t have the benefit of seeing or studying the images first, unless of course, you go through the Gallery from the Home Page first – more about that in the next point. The same options as from Study Then Guess are there, these include Show Painting, Show Hint or Skip the question altogether. For each incorrect answer you lose 2 points, as I found out!
Gallery
Gallery is the final option from the Home Page and allows you to browse the full catalog of 54 masterpieces and also to read text about each one.
Conclusion
As I mentioned in the introduction this app is incredibly addictive and so much fun. You do not have to be an art buff to play this game. It’s a great test of visual and memory skills. I offered this game to my little girl to play, she’s 8 and she also loved it. For young or old this is a whole lot of intellectual fun. Perhaps in the future it could link in to the Game Center for some even more competitive playing but for now it’s just perfect.
You can down load this app, which costs $4.99 here, if you’d live to give it a try out.
Joanne Carter
Joanne Carter is a British photography journalist, editor, curator, and the founder of *TheAppWhisperer.com*, one of the world’s leading platforms dedicated to mobile photography and art. Since its launch in 2009, TheAppWhisperer has become an international hub for artists of all levels to discover, learn, exhibit, and engage with contemporary photographic practice.Built on principles of inclusivity, accessibility, and artistic excellence, Joanne has spent almost two decades championing mobile photography as a serious artistic medium. Through interviews, critical essays, exhibitions, competitions, and education, she has helped shape and document the evolution of mobile art on a global scale.Her work has taken her internationally, lecturing on photography and mobile art at institutions and events including the Museum of Art in Seoul, South Korea, alongside appearances in the UK and Europe. She has served as a juror for international photography and mobile art awards across Portugal, Canada, the United States, South Korea, Italy, and the UK.Joanne is also the founder of *TheAppWhispererPrintSales.com*, one of the first online galleries dedicated exclusively to collectible mobile art, connecting artists with collectors across Europe, the United States, and Asia.Before founding TheAppWhisperer, Joanne worked extensively in print journalism and photographic publishing, including roles at a paparazzi photo agency and as deputy editor of a leading photography magazine. Her freelance journalism, criticism, and commentary have been published widely in both the UK and the US, with bylines in *The Times*, *The Sunday Times*, *The Guardian*, *Popular Photography*, *NikonPro*, *DPReview*, *Which?*, *Vogue Italia*, *LensCulture*, the *BBC*, and more recently, the *Financial Times*, where her published letters on photography continue to contribute to wider conversations around the medium.Alongside her editorial and curatorial work, Joanne’s own photographic practice has been exhibited internationally across the UK, Europe, South Korea, and the United States. Her work increasingly explores themes of grief, loss, death, memory, and the body.Her current research interests centre on grief, death, and poverty, with forthcoming postgraduate study leading towards doctoral research in these areas.Joanne is currently developing new long-form writing and photographic projects and is available for commissions, editorial projects, speaking engagements, and collaborations.Contact: joannetheappwhisperer@gmail.com)
