(IN)TANGIBLE HERITAGE(S)
Abstract
In the field of 3D digital reconstructions for cultural heritage, employed for their heuristic purpose (Rocheleau 2011) rather than for simple entertainment reasons, it is frequent – and very often fundamental – to work in synergy with experts from different fields (computer scientists, archaeologists, historians…), but also of various nationalities, thus speaking a variety of languages. This inevitably leads to the comparison between different methods and workflows, each of which has its own terminology at the basis. Therefore, comparing the different terms that are used (Clark 2010; Perlinska 2014), following their evolution and, to a certain extent, trying to standardise them is a prerequisite in order to make the reconstruction as objective and reproducible as possible, qualities that are of primary importance especially when the aim is the publication of the results in virtual research environments (Kuroczyński 2017; Champion and Rahaman 2020), so that they are accessible and understandable by a wide audience. This means that not only the digital reconstruction, but also the data model behind it becomes a social and cultural object that we cannot ignore. Terminology is only one of the open problems in the field of 3D digital reconstructions, which also deals, as we know, with issues related for example to different software and file formats, or even to the conservation of data and the platforms used to share them (Champion 2017). These problems, however, can hardly be addressed if not starting from a shared terminology and methodology, which should be the basis of every 3D digital reconstruction used in order to spread (and potentially enrich with new discoveries) cultural heritage, especially when we talk about hypothetical reconstructions of destroyed or never built artefacts (Strothotte, Masuch, and Isenberg 1999; Kensek 2007; Apollonio 2016; Grellert et al. 2019). In this case the dialogue between experts is a central element and it is therefore clear why, first of all, we need to agree upon the terms that we are going to use. The study here proposed aims to analyse in this sense some of the most frequent words among them, especially those related to the certainty and reliability of a digital reconstruction.
Irene Cazzaro is currently a PhD student in Architecture at the Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna (Italy). In 2015 she earned Master’s Degree in Architecture and Urban Planning with a major in Morphology from the IUAV University of Venice (Italy). Since 2015, she has worked as a teaching assistant at IUAV. In 2018 she received a grant from the Giorgio Cini Foundation in Venice to work at the Glass Study Centre, where she was in charge of the preservation, digitisation and online publication of archival documents, as well as the organisation of seminars, exhibitions and guided tours. She has participated as a speaker in several conferences mainly concerning architecture, design, image and imagination. In 2018 she was awarded the “Best Presentation” prize at the E.ART.H. Conference organised by the University of Bolzano. Her current research interests include the representation of architecture, morphology, morphogenesis and graphic design, between theoretical knowledge and practical outcomes. As a PhD student, she is conducting research on digital 3D models of artefacts that were destroyed or never built, with a cross-disciplinary approach involving the fields of Architecture, History of Art and Archaeology. Her work, partly developed also at Hochschule Mainz (Germany), mainly focuses on terminology and methodology, in an effort to set widely-accepted standards to be used in 3D visualisations, complying with principles such as integrity, reliability, sustainability and accessibility of the models.
5:00 pm - 6:30 pm
Friday 17th June, 2022