Digital Infrastructures for Digital Cultural Heritage and Media Art Research

The DARIAH Theme Day will revolve around the goal of broadening the existing DARIAH network as an invaluable infrastructure and connector for Digital Humanities researchers into the Media Art Research community as well as facilitating the collaboration of cultural heritage institutions and Digital Humanities researchers. The goal is to foster the work on documentation and preservation as well as knowledge generation about Digital Cultural Heritage, such as Digital Media Art, within this framework. Because Digital Artists use emerging technologies that originate from a scientific, military or industrial context as both their medium and their subject, which distinguishes this ‘new’ art from ‘traditional’ forms such as graphic printing, most Digital Artworks are produced in collaboration between artists, scientists and technicians. As such, Digital Art is a critical part of scientific discovery and technological development and should not be underestimated in its profound relevance for our societal infrastructures and scientific methodologies. World-wide alliances such as the Liverpool declaration (http://www.mediaarthistory.org/declaration), which was signed by more than 450 scholars and leading artists from 40 countries, raise awareness to the fact that many of the Digital Artworks can no longer be displayed. This declaration – in line with the Data Re-Use Charter – strengthens the need for Open Data in order to promote collaboration and advocate the sustainability, understanding and appreciation of media art heritage. This includes amongst others recognizing and building upon existing knowledge and resources, providing and fostering channels of communication for all stakeholders, enabling the international research community, artists as well as cultural institutions to create/upload/access data to be shared, and encouraging peer exchange. Thus open and re-usable data as well as a sustainable information infrastructure and international collaboration of all stakeholders – cultural institutions, artists and researchers alike – are at the core of sustainable archiving and preservation of media art.