

It was Armory Week this week in New York, so all the big art fairs were in town. I went to both Scope and Pulse over the weekend and noted that almost every gallery had an iPad–which was being used for showing off the artworks that the gallery was representing but couldn’t bring to the fair, as well as for email and web.
The iPad is a great way to showcase a gallery’s collection of work. The screen is big enough to give a good sense of what the art looks like, yet the device is small enough that a gallerist can simply hand the iPad over to the prospective customer and allow her to look at the images at her own pace.
The main drawback to using the iPad for showing an art collection is that it doesn’t allow you any sophisticated way to organize the images. You can’t search for keywords in photos, or arrange by title. The only way to group images is to create specific “albums” (folders) in iPhoto on the Mac, and then sync those specific albums over to the iPad.
I am sure that Apple will eventually bring metadata to the iPad pictures library, as well as searching of that metadata. Until then, there are a few paid iPad apps that allow for viewing and searching of metadata:
- Image Metadata Viewer, $0.99
- Sort Shots, $4.99
- Meta Editor, $9.99
Have you used any of these apps? Which is your favorite?
This great image, after a Bronzino painting, comes from Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com. Check out his other famous artworks doctored to introduce tech and other elements of modern life.