Display At Your Own Risk: An Experimental Exhibition of Digital Cultural Heritage

Abstract

A ll too often, cultural institutions frame their online terms of use by telling users what they cannot do with the content made available on their website, rather than focusing on what users can do with that content. We don't want to make the same mistake. The intellectual concerns that underpin this project are explored at length in this publication, but first and foremost we want users to engage with Display At Your Own Risk, creatively and otherwise. So, here are some of the things that you can do with the images and files within this online resource: print them out for pleasure or for study; hang them on the walls of your home or office; use them to create your own digital or analogue artwork; use them to order fabric and make curtains, a tablecloth, or something wearable; take the metadata and repurpose it, perhaps as a poem or as lyrics for a song. These suggestions are by no means exhaustive. You should be guided by your own intuition and interests. And above all, take time to enjoy the works in this exhibition. We have. You could, of course, decide to host your own version of Display At Your Own Risk. If so, you have two choices: you might choose from the selection of works included in the Display At Your Own Risk exhibition folder; alternatively, you might choose to curate your own exhibition. Should you choose the latter, instructions for how to Curate At Your Own Risk are included in the open source exhibition file, along with the exhibition folder containing our selections. But whatever you do, please share with us your use of this experimental exhibition by tagging it on Twitter and Facebook as #myDAYOR. Display At Your Own Risk features digital surrogates of public domain works of various sizes, resolutions, and formats printed to the material object's original dimensions. The exhibition is guided by a number of concerns. By printing the digital surrogate to the work's original dimensions, it invites reflection on the nature and quality of the reproductions that institutions make available online in place of the material object within their care. It considers the meaning of concepts such as access, transparency and user engagement in an age where digital collections are becoming increasingly relevant. And it explores tensions inherent in the ownership and use of cultural heritage, as well as the validity of the authorial claims that institutions assert over these digital surrogatessurrogates that are often viewed as new and independent assets. x i The digital surrogates selected for the exhibition represent some of the most treasured material objects of cultural heritage in the world. This catalogue is a testament to the cultural institutions trusted with the protection and preservation of these objects, as well as the difficulties overcome in making digital surrogates and releasing them online. The curator expresses her deep gratitude to the 52 institutions from 26 countries whose generous efforts have made this exhibition possible. It is with great pleasure that this collection of 100 digital sur...

Revisiting Access to Cultural Heritage in the Public Domain: EU and International Developments

“…16 See Wallace (2019), pp. [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39]; see also Wallace (2016), pp. 9-27.…”

Accessibility and Open GLAM

“…Unseen Art attempted to raise funds for a platform where users could contribute and download files for free, but the Indiegogo campaign was unsuccessful in reaching its £24,000 goal. 104 While such translations could be used for various audiences worldwide, the majority of GLAMs prohibit the type of access required, 105 and those with open policies rarely release data at the quality necessary for such a tool. 106 Revisiting an issue discussed above, how might someone request a high-resolution digital surrogate from a closed institution in order to translate the image from 2D to 3D?…”

Digital heritage tourism: innovations in museums

“…Licensing of images of museum collections has been made more efficient, yet more complicated, as images can be viewed on and downloaded from the Internet without requiring institutional approval. Museums' online "terms of use" lacks standardization, as these respond to institutional goals and national legal frameworks, while users lack understanding of the contract, copyright, and private international law to properly use these "terms of use" (Wallace & Deazley, 2016). The Creative Commons (CC) license provide a relatively easy and straightforward series of options with various degrees of conditions for use.…”