The BBC has announced that it will place all 200,000 of the U.K.'s nationally owned oil paintings online by 2012, the Guardian reports. Plans for the free Web site, to be called Your Paintings, were revealed today at a London event showcasing the BBC's devotion to art, music, and culture.

The Public Catalogue Foundation, launched in 2003, is partnering with the BBC for the project. The foundation hopes to see all of the works in question — only 20 percent of which are currently on public display — on the Internet by 2012. To date, the foundation has cataloged 30 percent of the total collection.

Additionally, the BBC and Arts Council England are in talks about providing free public free access to the Arts Council's digital archives for the first time. This will include access to the vast film archives dating back to the 1950s.

In other projects, BBC's Radio 4 and the British Museum have announced collaboration on a 100-part video series, "A History of the World in 100 Objects," in which select objects from the museum's collection will illustrate the history of the world. The free online project will be narrated by British Museum director Neil MacGregor.

Finally, the BBC's renewed devotion to the arts includes the creation of a pan-BBC arts board, which will attempt to maximize cultural programming. BBC director general Mark Thompson commented, "Today we are not only reaffirming our commitment to arts, but we're announcing a series of measures that will put this relationship on an even stronger footing. Through innovative new partnerships, I believe the BBC can deliver big, bold arts programmin gthat is accessible, distinctive, and enjoyable."