15 November 2011, Jerusalem EVA / MINERVA 2011 1

Sharing information about cultural heritage

Maria Sliwinska

Information in the Information Age is pricelessInformation overload

Means of communication– written: publications, Internet– oral: meetings, conferences– & social networks

Networks value– gather people who know, and support each

other – give recognition– allow thematic grouping & identification in

professional communities and beyond

Some networks examplesMINERVA (ICIMSS active since 2002)– In February 3rd, 2003 in Torun, (Poland) on

the meeting of the National Librarians organized in the framework of the DELOS-CEE project, devoted to “the current trends in digitisation”,

– It resulted in the network significant expansion

MINERVA follow upMICHAEL – inventory of digital collectionsATHENA – convinced number of museums to enter on a digital path, resulted with millions objects transfered to EuropeanaLinked Heritage – continues this work+ some other:

– EURIDICE Europeana Photography– DC-NET, and more

Some other project networks with the same goal – Europeana related group – EuropeanaLocal, EuropeanaConnect,– Europeana Judaica, Europeana

Travel…– ATHENA, Linked HeritageContributing to Europeana and working

with the aggregators

Projects results– Support professionals in their further work– Offers products to the users

Projects results/products important for professionals– publications: guidance, handbooks– standards, recommendations (LIDO)– workshops, courses (including dl)– portals

Projects result important for the users– Give access to cultural heritage of the world

from their homes like to the water from the tubs

– Allow to share opinions through social networks

A short evidence– Publishing house from Florence contacted

us with request for help in getting information about an Italian painter works available in Poland

– They got an information about some paintings of Andrea Scacciati in Krakow National Museum but haven’t got answer to their request for help so found my name through the MICHAEL portal

Users

Users

Dear mrs Sliwinska,

I beg your pardon to address myself to you, as a perfect stranger, with a little complicated question, but I do hope you can help me.

Our Publishing House is working at a monograph about Italian painter Andrea Scacciati the Elder edited by prof. Sandro Bellesi. We have been informed that probably a work by Scacciati is part of Krakow National Museum's collection. So we contacted the Museum to have a reproduction: negative, no Scacciati paintings on their files. Maybe the work bears another author's name, but up to now we couldn't send them any image to check if it is really so.

Looking at the site Michael Polska (http://www.michael-culture.pl:8080/mpf/pub-mpf/document.html?id=PL-DC-1ab8fe1c&base=dcollection&no=28&hppage=20&querybase=dcollection&pagename=advanced-search-results&totaldocs=76&from1=form-search-dc&qid=miKl-q), we learn of the existence of a digital collection (Malarstwo europejskie) that contains a painting of Scacciati, or at least reports his name among the authors cited, apparently being part of the collections of Krakow Museum (or similar institution).

Since on Michael Poland's site l couldn't find any trace of an e-mail account, I resolved to dare disturb you. Since my knowledge of Polish is tremendously poor, I can't understand if Malarstwo europejskie deals with works in Polish Museums or is is simply a collection of European art. In the first case, is it possible to purchase the Cd or DVD with reproductions together with reproduction rights or, at least, to know which work or works by Scacciati are in it? This would at least help us to solve the problem with Krakow Museum and let them know which work we are interested to.

Thank you for yor (prolonged) attention. Any information would help, included name and address of a Michael Poland officer.

Sincerely,

What went wrong?– They found an information about Scaciatti

paintings that were available not in Krakow but in Wroclaw, (they didn’t distinguished between the two different cities)

– They sent an e-mail with request to the Rector not to a librarian or museum custodian so their request wasn’t probably found as a professional mail but a kind of spam

What we found for them?– 1 painting of Scacciati in the National Musuem in

Wrocław– 2 woodcuts of Scacciatii at the same museum (all of

these in digital form but not available online)– And - a part of oil painting by Scacciati in Krakow, but

not in the museum but in a convent– We made a contact between them and the Museum

staff (in Wrocław)– We made a contact between them an a research from

Torun who wrote a paper about a painting in Krakow

Lessons learnt from this case– Information presented in the portals (Michael,

Europeana etc.) is useful but not always clear for the users because of:

Unknown institutional structure in cultural domain in foreign countries

Information presented in national languages is not readable

Missing information about possible human mediation – who can help with further investigation

How to improve the situtation?– User-friendly authority files and/or thesauri

Shared by the contributing institutionsAvailable to the users

– English translationNot only basic metadata (not always available) but with a short summary of the content, origins, history etc.

– Contact points available for further support querries

– More attention in digitizing cultural objects important for other nations

Continuation of work – Linked Heritage– WP2 - Linking Cultural Heritage Information

Exploring cultural heritage information best practice:Resource identification Technical specifications Enabling linked cultural heritage data

– WP3 – Terminology Terminology Registry:Identification of terminologies as used by cultural institutions and private partners: Identification of needs in terminology management:State of the art & gap analysis Specification of the software environment Implementation and testing of the software environment

Continuation of work – Linked Heritage– WP4 – Public Private Partnership

Private Sector Business Exploration Contribution Specification Metadata model selection:Technical Specification

– WP5 - Technical IntegrationValidation environment Terminology management system Gateway:

Continuation of work – Linked Heritage– WP6 – Coordination of Content

Content delivery to Europeana Feedback:

– WP7 – Dissemination & Training Dissemination: Training:

Some plans for improvement in communication (LH)– A portal Digitalmeetingculture

As a forum for people from cultural institutions, art. & IT sector. As a place where info from and about all projects from art and cultural heritage can be advertised and sharedAs a place where some results of the finished projects could be foundAs a place where an art galery can be foundAs a place where information about events can be placedAs a place with addresses of contact points where information can be requested in the area of interest i.e. cultural heritage in digital form.