Digital meets Culture

Upcoming changes to Wikimedia Commons will make it easier to add, update, and find important information about individual files and entire collections.

Research on GLAM use of Wikimedia Commons to understand what to improve and why it matters

by Sandra Fauconnier, Community Liaison for Structured Data on Wikimedia Commons, Wikimedia Foundation.

I call this piece “Pig’s heart, with metadata”. Photo by Museum of Veterinary Anatomy FMVZ USP/Wagner Souza e Silva, CC BY-SA 4.0.

In 2017-2019, together with the community of Wikimedia volunteers, a team at the Wikimedia Foundation and Wikimedia Deutschland updates Wikimedia Commons, Wikimedia’s media repository, to work with structured data.

This will make it easier to add, update and find important information about individual files and entire collections.

In order to learn more about the needs of users of Wikimedia Commons, we perform quite a bit of design research. This helps us understand what to improve, and why it matters.

In the past months, we have surveyed and interviewed cultural institutions (GLAMs), asking them about their processes, wishes and pain points when they contribute media to Wikimedia Commons.

The research is now concluded and summarized in this blog post:
https://blog.wikimedia.org/2018/01/29/glam-multimedia-metadata-commons/

The full report can be found at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Supporting_Commons_contribution_by_GLAM_institutions

Slides to follow alongside this video: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:GLAM_SDC_research_presentation_Jan_2018.pdf

Singapore, 5-8 February 2018

IEEE World Forum on The Internet-of-Things

The theme of the Conference is “Smart Cites and Nations” in recognition of Singapore’s strides in embracing “Smart” — policies, principles, and practices — for which IoT is an important technology enabler. The World Forum on The Internet of Things consists of an outstanding Technical Program featuring the latest advances and experiences with IoT for the Academic and Research Community, a set of Vertical and Topical Area tracks of interest to Industry and to the Public Sector, and is relevant locally to Singapore and the larger Asia Pacific region.

We expect attendance and participation from leading Research Institutions, Government Organizations responsible for IoT from around the World, and practitioners from major International Enterprises that provide products, goods, and services based on IoT.

Hear Minister Yaacob Ibrahim about the technologies, business models, and processes that are transforming the Smart Nation of Singapore
Listen to William Ruh who is the CEO of GE Digital about how IoT is driving the next wave of Industrial Practices
Share the experience with Chris O’Connor, the General Manager of IoT Applications at IBM, of how Artificial Intelligence is changing the landscape for many of IBM’s customers
Let Maciej Kranz, the VP of Corporate Innovation at Cisco take you through the journey that he sees for IoT and the impact of IoT at the World Forum in Davos.
Take a peek at the future as Jan Rabaey, Chair of Engineering and Computer Science at Berkeley shares the vision of IoT and the wonders coming out of today’s laboratories.

If you want to understand IoT and the underlying technologies, take part in the full day of tutorials and workshops on the first day of WF-IoT2018. If you are technical oriented or a researcher listen to any of the 145 papers that will address IoT in depth and give you a glimpse of the future.

If you wish to know how IoT will impact your industry attend any of the five Vertical Tracks where Industry experts and practitioners will share their experiences. For engineers, managers, administrators, and practitioners interested in practical aspects of IoT attend any of the five Topical Area Tracks. Each is populated with experts and speakers from around the world.

Website: http://wfiot2018.iot.ieee.org/

BYZART aims to make 75,000 new digital objects accessible through Europeana Collections, and put into light other content that is already available online

The BYZART project: creating one of the widest online collections of Byzantine art and archaeology

Funded as a part of the 2016 Generic Services call, this new project BYZART, led by University of Bologna, aims to digitize, catalogue and make available rich archive collections about Byzantine cultural heritage in Europeana, the European digital library.

The project aims to make 75,000 new digital objects accessible online through Europeana Collections. During the project photos, video and audio content, as well as 3D surveys and reconstructions about Byzantine history and culture will be digitised. The content and accompanying narratives will capture users’ attention and provide them with a rich online experience. In addition, the digitised data will enhance Europeana’s artistic content by adding to the Byzantine art and archaeology material already available on the platform.

the project group at the kick.off meeting in Bologna

Byzantine culture is one of the milestones of European cultural heritage. For centuries, it spread all over the Mediterranean a homogeneous civilization despite regional diversities with strong influence over later European artistic and cultural expressions. Nevertheless, nowadays the wide heritage of the Byzantine art in Europe is undervalued, even if each Mediterranean region preserves remarkable memories and traces of its Byzantine past.

The BYZART project proposes to raise awareness about this impressive heritage, by showcasing collections of archive photographs, audio-visual materials and 3D reconstructions in Europeana Collections.

More info: https://pro.europeana.eu/post/byzantine-art-and-archaeology

February 8, 2018. Hungary, Budapest. Unmissable event for those who are involved in the preservation and support of Roma minorities heritage. Shaping desired futures by contemplating possible, probable and preferable futures.

Conference: The Future of Roma Cultural Heritage

The conference, organized by the European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture (ERIAC) and hosted by the Romani Studies Program of the Central European University (CEU RSP), was supported by the contribution of REACH (project theme H2020-SC6-CULT-COOP-2016-2017, EU Research and Innovation Programme, Horizon 2020, Re-designing Access to European Cultural Heritage).
The event was opened by the presentation of ERIAC to the audience, it’s mission and philosophy; participants were invited to actively contribute to the dialogue focused on the main question ‘the future of Roma cultural heritage’ contemplating possible futures and striving to shape the fields in desired directions.
With ERIAC’s headquarters and main office opening in Berlin in Oct 2017, ERIAC started its international activities with the International Cultural Outreach Program. Within the framework of the program, which encompasses seven events in major European cities, it celebrated the large network of Roma individuals and organizations working in the fields of arts and culture.
The conference was held on February 8, 2018, 15.00h-20.00h at CEU Auditorium A
1051 Budapest, Nador u. 15.
Those interested to attend the event had to confirm their participation and RSVP before January 2018 at:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfHm_VMuoPgByENtVWyXhZjLq9J-UAQDcKh3hCtmXEC7UcxSA/viewform
To read more about the program and the organizers of the conference:
https://eriac.nobadkid.org/

Prague (Czech Republic), 4-7 June 2018

ELAG conference 2018: BLEND/DEBLEND

It is with great pleasure to announce that the 42nd International Conference of the European Library Automation Group will be held at the National Library of Technology in Prague, Czech Republic from June 4 to 7 2018.

The European Library Automation Group series of conferences focus on the application of information technology in libraries and documentation centers. For over forty years, the ELAG Conferences have provided library and IT professionals with the opportunity to discuss new technologies, to review on-going developments and to exchange best practices. Moreover, ELAG Conferences are the platform for librarians, IT professionals and other participants to discuss the current situation, challenges and advancements relating to libraries and of information technology.

The meetings aim at in depth discussions of particular library automation topics and at the promotion of informal exchange of ideas and experience. Topics of past conferences have included digital libraries, library portals, institutional repositories, web services, digital preservation, open source software and open access. The topics covered are technical and meant for participants with an appropriate technical background.

The ELAG Conferences are divided into bootcamp, presentation and workshop sessions. Due to this innovative and interactive structure ELAG Conferences provide participants with a way to learn from experts and veterans in a particular domain and to acquire new skills, enhance their knowledge and get a more in-depth view of a specific topic.

Theme of ELAG2018: BLEND/DEBLEND

Nowadays we are used to data being dispersed in different locations, formats and environments. We reference data, linking and blending them to be useful to our users. We started re-using data by harvesting OAI repositories and we ended up copying everything as-is instead of blending data using standard web protocols. The vision is that merging distributed data using web services (microservices) will enable us to better blend and re-use data. Yet, we are still living in a world of monolithic data structures; we need to go forward and try to use standard web data-formats and reconsider library data description rules in light of this. On the other hand, we are faced with monolithic legacy systems which, though moving to the cloud, are pretty hard to ‘deconstruct’. Here we should deblend as well. Our local IT infrastructure is also moving to a blended environment where web services and enterprise service buses are supposed to orchestrate a universal information environment. It is not an easy task to use the existing library systems in this kind of environment.

Call for participation and more info: https://elag.org/

VR and AR simulation based on photogrammetry and data visualization allow for a highly realistic experience

CROC simulates State Hermitage Museum’s Jupiter Hall in Virtual Reality

CROC’s Virtual Reality Center specialists developed a digital copy of the State Hermitage Museum’s Jupiter Hall to demonstrate it in virtual reality. This unparalleled project in the Russian museum domain aims to promote the national cultural heritage.

Using the photogrammetry technology, the project team reconstructed sculptures, scenery and interiors of the hall with a total of more than 46 exhibits, including world famous masterpieces, such as the Portrait of a Roman Woman (known as A Syrian Woman) and the portraits of Emperors Lucius Verus, Balbinus and Philip the Arabian. To visit the museum, a person just puts on virtual reality glasses and sees a photorealistic image of the hall, while using a joystick to approach any exhibit and listen to information about the history of its creation, creator and art style.

[Show as slideshow]

The project makes the State Hermitage Museum’s collections available to a great number of people, including those with disabilities, and will help demonstrate the cultural heritage in the museum branches and during various external expositions. In the future, the project is going to transform from a proof of concept into a full-scale digital simulation of the entire museum.

More: http://vr.croc.ru/eng/

20th March 2018,Royal Museum of Arts and History, Brussels

Innovation and Cultural Heritage

High-level Horizon 2020 conference of The European Year of Cultural Heritage

The event, organised by the European Commission Directorate General for Research and Innovation, in close cooperation with the Directorates General for Education and Culture and for Communications Networks, Content and Technology showcased the dialogue between contemporary European society and the most promising innovation initiatives in the field of Cultural Heritage, supported by the EU.

The conference is part of the programme of the European Year of Cultural Heritage and contributed to its legacy by launching a public discussion about the objectives of European research and innovation policy for Cultural Heritage beyond 2020.

Most European citizens consider Cultural Heritage to be very important to create cohesion at the European level and new job opportunities. A public survey also found that the resources currently allocated by public authorities to the promotion of Cultural Heritage are considered insufficient for this purpose.
The conference on the 20th of March aimed to cope with this requirement.

Cultural Heritage is a kind of inheritance selected by a nation or a community, and reflects social and economic systems of value and cultural politics, including human rights.
The most important challege for EU research and innovation policy is improving access and sharing of Cultural Heritage by promoting new ideas, new forms of social organisation and human agency.
European action shall contribute to the development of integrated approaches that will enhance the contribution of Cultural Heritage to sustainable development through the preservation and regeneration of urban and rural cultural landscapes.
New methodologies, coordination and more integrated approaches between national and European levels are required in order to increase the input that Cultural Heritage gives to the improvement of sustainable economic growth, new job creation and external trade.
The European Year of Cultural Heritage celebrates the diverse representations of Cultural Heritage across Europe, at EU, national, regional and local levels. The aim is to encourage more people to discover and engage with Europe’s Cultural Heritage, and to reinforce a sense of belonging to a common European cultural space.

Of particular interest for REACH have been the two presentations of Prof. Civantos, by the University of Granada, Partner of the REACH Social Platform, who reported on Community-led traditional cultural landscape management, and Ms Pamela Lama, by the Municipality of Bologna, Italy, who presented the achievements of the ROCK project, that is associated to REACH.

Conference report and outcomes are available at the conference webpage:

https://ec.europa.eu/info/events/innovation-and-cultural-heritage-2018-mar-20_en

Information and registration to INNOVATION AND CULTURAL HERITAGE Conference are available on https://ec.europa.eu/info/events/innovation-and-cultural-heritage-2018-mar-20_en

Conference Program

Transposition journal's new issue wants to focus on the dialectic between tangibility and intangibility in music exhibition, conservation, and transmission

Call for papers on the theme “Music: Intangible Heritage?”

The peer-reviewed journal Transposition, Musique et sciences sociales opens a call for papers for its n° 8 issue, on the theme “Music: Intangible Heritage?”.

Abstracts of proposals (~1500-2500 words) in French or English should be sent by February 1, 2018, to: transposition.submission@gmail.com. Articles will be expected by the end of Spring.

Transposition invites the broad spectrum of social and human sciences to take up a critical reflection on the heritagisation of music, taking the growing dissemination of the “intangible cultural heritage” paradigm as the starting point for a more general analysis of the interplay between music, heritage, and intangibility. From case studies to theoretical proposals, papers can focus on the following themes:

Music and “intangible cultural heritage”: political and aesthetic issues.
Musical heritage in question: history and renewals of heritage conservation practices.
The tangibility and intangibility of music.

The complete call is available through this link.

Brussels (Belgium), 20th March 2018

Innovation and Cultural Heritage

Horizon 2020 conference of The European Year of Cultural Heritage

20th March 2018

Royal Museum of Arts and History, Brussels

The high-level conference – organised by the European Commission Directorate General for Research and Innovation, in close cooperation with Directorates General for Education and Culture and for Communications Networks, Content and Technology – will showcase the dialogue between contemporary European society and the most promising innovations in the field of cultural heritage that European policies and funds have supported. The conference sessions will highlight policy, social, technological, methodological innovations and new, promising partnerships for cultural heritage. The speakers – leading European politicians, museum curators and scientists – of the conference will discuss policy developments, success stories and future challenges.

The conference is part of the programme of the European Year of Cultural Heritage and will contribute to its legacy by launching the public discussion about the objectives of European research and innovation policy for cultural heritage beyond 2020. The beautiful Royal Museum of Arts and History of Brussels provides a most suitable and motivating environment for discussions about European cultural heritage and innovation.

Programme: https://ec.europa.eu/info/sites/info/files/conferences/innovation_and_cultural_heritage_conference_2018_-_agenda.pdf

Website and registration: https://ec.europa.eu/info/events/innovation-and-cultural-heritage-2018-mar-20_en

Live streaming also available

A great opportunity to identify good practices for the promotion and preservation of small towns heritage.

Upcoming workshop. Small towns in promotion of its cultural heritage: possibilities and experiences

SAVE THE DATE: February 15, 2018. Jana Palacha square, 2, Praha 1, 2nd floor, room 201. Charles University leader of the HORIZON 2020 REACH Project pilot on small towns heritage, promotes the first workshop with associated partners of Czech Republic.

Small towns are a distinct feature of European settlement and are often per se part of CH, for their architecture, monuments, churches, and for any other form of CH in public places, as well as for the intangible heritage linked to the territory. Despite this, they remain in the shadow of the big cities and metropolis.

The workshop, that will take place in the venue of the Faculty of Arts of CUNI, will face the main critical points of the theme and, in accordance with REACH Pilot goal, will try to answer to questions such as
“How to involve the small town in the game?”
“How to gain external attention for the small town?”
“How to motivate citizens to participate?”,
addressing the matter from the perspective of the “big actors” as well as from the local one.

To download the Workshop program in English
To download the Workshop program in Czech
To download the REACH Project presentation in Czech