British Council Collection

The British Council Art department have a unique charter: to show their collection of over eight thousand contemporary works of British art, without having a building: it has been defined "A museum without walls".

Instead, the British Council organises a comprehensive programme of exhibitions and lends works to other institutions throughout the world to help promote the awareness of its collection.

Keepthinking have designed a website for the collections that follow and expand on this subject. As information about exhibitions is as important as that about works, the two aspects are always presented side by side. The site is not so much about what's happening now - which can be found elsewhere - but rather a mean to give a precise accounts of where works have been over the past 75 years and of the extensive network of relationships built.

http://collection.britishcouncil.org/common/home/3/map

In a rather unique case of a design that spread from digital to physical, Keepthinking and the British Council have also designed a virtual map of such information, which is now on display at the Whitechapel Gallery in London.