Spain's Prado Museum has collaborated with Google Earth to bring visitors from all around the globe closer to their artworks than ever before, reports the Associated Press.

Employing the same technology used to provide detailed, street-level images of locations all around the world, Google Earth allows visitors to the site to zoom in on a selection of 14 works from the museum, including Velazquez's Las Meninas and Goya's Third of May, getting closer to the image than they could in the museum.

The images are 1,400 times clearer that what would be rendered with a 10-megapixel camera, according to Google Spain director Javier Rodriquez Zapatero, allowing viewers to examine a wasp on a flower petal in Rubens's The Three Graces, or a teardrop in Roger van der Weyden's Descent from the Cross.

"Normally you have to stand a good distance away from these works, but this offers you the chance to see details that you could only see from a big ladder placed right beside them," said Google worker Clara Rivera, who conceived of the project.

In order to create the images, Google, which sponsored the project, took 8,200 photos between May and July of last year.

To see the works, type "Prado Museum" into Google Earth's search engine.

Prado director Miguel Zugaza believes the new technology is no substitute for a trip to the museum, however. "With the digital image we're seeing the body of the paintings with almost scientific detail," he said. "What we don't see is the soul. The soul will always only be seen by contemplating original."