Telematic network for teaching art history in universities (First phase : January 2002 - June 2003)

Description :

The aim of the project is to introduce and test a mechanism that will allow the exchange of digital images reserved for the teaching of art history at university. Its aim is to rationalise development of the image banks planned within each of the university partners (FUNDP, KUL, UCL and ULg) and, at the same time, to utilise high-quality pictures from specific image suppliers (KBR and KIK/IRPA). The project makes provision for the introduction of digital photo libraries within the different partners to replace conventional multimedia slides. This will allow a richer and more flexible perception of the works of art.

A critical mass of around 1,500 digital photographs supplied by IRPA and a further 300 supplied by the KIK/IRPA-KBR consortium is essential in order to test the system’s technical as well as its educational value. However, this volume will allow tests to be conducted on only one complete course subject.

With the support of the technical provider, who will be selected following the establishment of a focused set of specifications, the partners will test the mutualisation of picture digitisation within the framework of databanks that are distinctive, yet accessible from a single gateway. Above and beyond this, the partners will contemplate together the technical, educational and legal implications of multimedia use in the teaching of art history. They will define a set of recommendations involving processes for the exchange of artistic heritage imagery, from generation through to dissemination and including database descriptions.

They will also define standard metadata, adopt a technique for watermarking the disseminated images and propose measures relative to the long-term conservation of integrated data and the enhancement of image delivery procedures.

Furthermore, the university partners will participate in enhancing the information contained in KIK/IRPA and BRB/KBR databanks. Lastly, the partners will determine the structure necessary in order to continue efforts on a grander scale once the project has been completed by widening the partnership to include other teaching centres (university or other).

New information and communication technologies will also enable the introduction of this scientific imagery/information in order to meet the long-expressed desire of politicians to see a better interference between the work provided by the universities and by Belgium’s federal scientific establishments, whose ranks include KBR and KIK/IRPA.

Substantively, an operational module will be proposed at the end of phase one of the project for the production, classification and dissemination of images to professors at the university partners. The validity of this module and its educational implications will have been tested and evaluated on a course subject. At the end of this first phase, a critical report will be presented on the legal implications of this new teaching method along with recommendations for the experiment’s development during the second phase.

Phase two itself will be devoted to system testing and initial system applications. In addition to the images digitised by KBR and KIK/IRPA during phase one, illustrations will be digitised for a different course at each of the partner university institutions and made available to professors on the network. There are also plans to make the pilot system available to other interested institutions. At the same time, the system’s multimedia bases will be presented to the students.

- Contact person (project's coordinator):

Royal Library of Belgium (KBR)
Willy Vanderpijpen
Boulevard de l’Empereur 4 / Keizerlaan
1000 BRUXELLES / BRUSSEL
Tel : 02 519 57 01
Fax : 02 519 56 10
willy.vanderpijpen@kbr.be


PARTNERSHIP

Coordinator Royal Library of Belgium (KBR)

Partner 1 Royal Institute for cultural heritage (KIK-IRPA)

Partner 2 Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) Chaire de Droit de l’information et de la communication

Partner 3 Université de Liège (ULg) Section d’Histoire de l’art et archéologie

Partner 4 Université Catholique de Louvain (UCL) Département d’Archéologie et histoire de l’art

Partner 5 Facultés Universitaires Notre-Dame de la Paix de Namur (FUNDP) Section d’histoire et de l’art

Partner 6 Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (KUL) Studiecentrum Vlaamse Miniaturisten