Hello, Flying back from Siberia to Moscow at the beginning of this week, I happened to sit next to an employee of the State Historical Museum (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Historical_Museum), who is taking care of the museum's collection of photographs. I told her that museums and archives in Western countries are collaborating with Wikimedia to make their collections better accessible to the public and offered her to provide her with information about such collaborations, so they could consider it at the SHM. In general, she seemed quite open-minded towards such a collaboration.
>From her, I gathered the following information: - All graphic pieces (photographs and various sorts of prints, including manuscripts and books) have already been digitized; the question of long-term preservation, however, has not been solved yet. - The other objects of the museum are also being photographed (all in all there are around 4.5 mio. objects); this process is still ongoing. - It is still open how they will make use of the opportunities of the Internet more extensively to present their objects to the public. I guess, these three points illustrate the main issues of interest we should address in dealing with museums and archives: - What extra value can Wikimedia and/or partner organizations offer with regard to digital representation of works of art? (some museums may already have gone through this process, e.g. Zentrum Paul Klee) - What extra value can Wikimedia and/or partner organizations offer with regard to long-term preservation of digital material? (I'm not sure whether Wikimedia is planning to acquire key know-how in this area, maybe collaboration with partner organizations, such as http://www.cultlib.ch/ would make sense) - What extra value can Wikimedia and/or partner organizations offer with regard to bringing objects closer to their publics? Please keep us up to date as to further contacts and experiences with GLAMs. It probably would make sense to set up a GLAM task force to tackle these issues in a coordinated manner, starting with existing initiatives and Zentrum Paul Klee, for example... Best, Beat > -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- > Von: wikimediach-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikimediach-l- > boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] Im Auftrag von Rama Neko > Gesendet: Mittwoch, 21. Juli 2010 20:16 > An: wikimediach-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Betreff: [Wikimediach-l] Museums and local Wikimedias > > Hello, > > In the recent months, there have been a number of projets in which a > number of local chapters of Wikimedia came into contact with museums > and were granted access to the reserves for photographs to be > realised. Proeminent examples are the British Museum, and the Natural > history museum of Toulouse. > > On a purely personal level, I have recently had a very positive > experience with the Military Musem of Morges, where photography is > allowed without a flash but where tripods are OK. You can see some of > the results here: > http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Rama/Château_de_Morges > I have had a little chat with one of the conservators of the museum, > and he was quite knowledgeable and friendly towards Wikimedia projects > (actually he used some of our material). > > I have recently visited the Landesmuseum in Zurich, where photography > is not allowed, which is a shame because there are a number of > interesting items. Would Wikimedia-CH be interested in setting up a > little lobbying campaign aimed at museums to obtain autorisation to > photographs their collections ? We have a number of quite capable > photographs available in Switzerland, so I am confident that we could > produce a convincing porte-folio and that the conservators would not > regret granting us access. > As a first step, it could already be interesting if Wikimedians > could state that they want to take photographs "for Wikipedia and for > Wikimedia CH", and have a the contact of a person of reference at > WM-CH for hand out. > > Cheers ! > -- Rama > > _______________________________________________ > http://wikimedia.ch Wikimedia CH website > Wikimediach-l mailing list > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediach-l _______________________________________________ http://wikimedia.ch Wikimedia CH website Wikimediach-l mailing list https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediach-l
