A New Medium for Old Masters: The Kress Study Collection Virtual Museum Project Author(s): James Andrews Source: Art Documentation: Journal of the Art Libraries Society of North America, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1998), pp. 19-27 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Art Libraries Society of North America Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27948930 . Accessed: 14/06/2014 22:04 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. . The University of Chicago Press and Art Libraries Society of North America are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Art Documentation: Journal of the Art Libraries Society of North America. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 195.78.109.157 on Sat, 14 Jun 2014 22:05:00 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Transcript
A New Medium for Old Masters: The Kress Study Collection Virtual Museum ProjectAuthor(s): James AndrewsSource: Art Documentation: Journal of the Art Libraries Society of North America, Vol. 17,No. 1 (Spring 1998), pp. 19-27Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Art Libraries Society of NorthAmericaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27948930 .
Accessed: 14/06/2014 22:04
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].
.
The University of Chicago Press and Art Libraries Society of North America are collaborating with JSTOR todigitize, preserve and extend access to Art Documentation: Journal of the Art Libraries Society of NorthAmerica.
http://www.jstor.org
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Virtual Museum Project by James Andrews, MLS, Doctoral Candidate, School oflnformation Science and Learning Technologies, College of Education and Predoctoral Fellow, Department of Health Manage ment and Informatics, School of Medicine, University of Missouri-Columbia, and Werner
Schweibenz, Graduate Student oflnformation Science, University of Saarland, Germany
[The following article was the winner of the 1996 Gerd Muehsam Award. This award recognizes excellence in a paper written by a graduate student on a topic relevant to art
librarianship or visual resources curatorship.]
Abstract The Kress Study Collection Virtual Museum Project
was designed for the course "Information Storage and
Retrieval," which introduced graduate students in the School of Library and Informational Science at the Uni
versity of Missouri-Columbia to concepts of electronic
storage and retrieval of documents, images, and data, with an emphasis on the design of computer networked access to databases. This project is a prototype of a small virtual museum that presents the University of Missouri Columbia Museum of Art and Archaeology's Kress Study Collection through digital images and scholarly text stored in a relational database that is accessible on the
World Wide Web, and uses new technology for electronic
curatorship in a virtual museum. The project's paper describes the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, which holds a rich collection of European artworks, mostly Old Mas ter paintings from the thirteenth to the eighteenth cen
tury. Also treated are the digitizing of the Kress paint ings, the construction of the database, the realization of
Web accessibility, and the problem of defining the vir tual museum. A searchable virtual museum based on a user-centered philosophy is hard to find because muse ums are reluctant to make their holdings accessible on
the World Wide Web. It is even harder to define, both because of the heated discussion in the museum litera ture and the fascination of the new medium that often leads to sites lacking quality and a user-driven philoso phy.
Introduction and Overview of the Project
Introduction As the promise of the World Wide Web and globally
networked communications continues to attract millions of potential Web-publishers each year, the race to post a
site, regardless of its relative worth, is one approached with seemingly little discernment. Museums, however, appear understandably ambivalent about the notion of this new environment. Some of the largest museums in the world, such as the Louvre, the National Museum of
American Art, and the National Gallery in London, have embraced the Web and have provided access to a large portion of their collections. Although a search on the Web reveals that many smaller museums do have Web sites, few seem to offer a searchable, online collection. How
ever, with the changing nature of the provision of infor mation as well as issues pertaining to copyright and
ownership still in dispute, perhaps some wariness is not
entirely unwarranted. Many museums with some or much of their holdings online may call themselves vir tual museums, but it is hard to find any with accessible collections and with education or user-driven presenta tions of their holdings. This makes a clear definition of the virtual museum an elusive problem. It has become, like so much of the Web terminology, an indiscriminately used buzzword. Nevertheless, one should remain opti mistic about the prospect of Web-based museums. By offering another form of access to a collection, or por tions of several collections connected in cyberspace, mu seums can give users, some of whom might never be ex
posed to certain art works, an option or starting point to discover art not virtually, but in a virtual museum.
The Kress Study Collection Project is a prototype of a small virtual museum endeavor. By considering the
user, however ambiguously defined, and issues related to content, responsible Web-authoring, and database
management, the authors have sought to provide remote access to a small portion of the University of Missouri
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Columbia Museum of Art and Archaeology's Kress Study Collection through digital images and substantive text stored in a relational database. This small model has led to consideration of some broader implications that might relate to similar, albeit larger-scaled projects. Generally, the same consistency and care should be applied to a vir tual museum that is applied to a traditional one when
using the Web as a means to transcend the limits of pre senting art in a conventional manner.
The Concept of the Project The project was designed in response to a require
ment for "Information Storage and Retrieval" (Informa tion Science 412), a class taught by Dr. Timothy Patrick
during the 1996 fall semester at the School of Library and Informational Science (now the School of Information Science and Learning Technologies within the College of
Education) at the University of Missouri-Columbia. The
goal of the class was to introduce students to termino
logy and concepts associated with the electronic storage and retrieval of documents, images, and data, with an
emphasis on the design of computer networked access to databases, especially via the World Wide Web (WWW).
The Kress Study Collection Project dealt with a spe cific portion of the Museum of Art and Archaeology's collection, consisting of fourteen European artworks
spanning several centuries (the collection is described in more detail in the following section). The aim was to store
digitized versions of these paintings, as well as accom
panying textual information, in a relational database that could be accessed through the WWW. It was meant to serve as a prototype for what is possible for an entire
museum collection, or for other Kress Study Collections
throughout the country. This project was done in accor dance with the central concept of the Kress Foundation, that the artworks that compose the collections should serve the education and enrichment of all persons throughout the world. In other words, while the paint ings themselves might only be experienced completely by a visit to the museum, increased awareness and ap preciation of them could begin with accessing digital rep resentations coupled with scholarly content via the Web.
In choosing to make the Kress Study Collection the
project's focus, we enlisted the cooperation of the cura tors of the Museum of Art and Archaeology, who pro vided us with useful insights and advice during the se lection process. Several factors influenced the decision to choose this collection. A model or prototype was de
sired, which led to the selection of a small, manageable, but diverse collection of art as the basis of the database. Rather than select a specific epoch or genre of art, the fourteen paintings in this collection were deemed suffi
cient, with the added convenience of their being related to each other as part of a specific donation. Moreover, the museum was just finishing the final drafts of a cata
log describing the Kress Study pieces, which became the
scholarly text augmenting the digitized pictures. The museum had made slides of each piece during a recent restoration project, the quality of which is far greater than that of scanned print images. Finally, since these paint ings are part of the larger Kress donations at museums
across the country, a successful project might inspire the future creation of a virtual museum containing all Kress
Study Collections. The decision to focus on the Kress Study Collection
was the first of several major steps needed to complete the prototype. Once it was decided that the collection was the appropriate subject, design and construction of the database was begun. This necessarily involved the con sideration of potential users, relationships among the data to be stored, and special concerns regarding the treatment of the digital images and text. Only after an effective da tabase was created could work begin on Web accessibil
ity. Primary attention was concentrated on the user's needs, to ensure that content would precede form. How ever, some serious issues arose that could not be ignored, including that of attempting to define a virtual museum.
A detailed account of the project is offered below, pref aced with a historical sketch describing how the Kress Collection came into being.
The Kress Study Collection The Museum of Art and Archaeology at the Univer
sity of Missouri-Columbia1 received the Kress Study Col lection from the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, which con tinues the legacy of its founder and benefactor, Samuel
H. Kress (1863-1955). Kress was a self-made millionaire who built his fortune on a chain of "five and dime" stores that he established around the turn of the century. Once he retired, Kress pursued his love for Italian art, eventu
ally collecting nearly 3,000 objects, including more than I, 400 Old Master paintings.2
Like other American industrialists and businessmen of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries ?
Andrew Carnegie and John Jacob Astor, for example? Kress felt a philanthropic obligation to repay the Ameri can people for the wealth he had amassed. This obliga tion led him to share his extensive art collection with the
public. He began by organizing a traveling exhibition, which first opened in the fall of 1932 and involved a nine month tour of eight major American cities. The exhibi tion consisted of pictures from Siena, Florence, and
Venice, and covered five centuries of Italian painting se lected in a thoughtful balance of education and aesthet ics.3 The traveling exhibit was wildly popular and was soon extended to an additional sixteen cities, finally end
ing in June 1935. In October 1935, Kress resolved to create a founda
tion to which he would donate his entire collection. Rather than building a single museum, however, he used his
money to purchase even more art, which he intended to donate to various museums throughout the country. The Kress Foundation began with a sizable donation in 1941 to the newly opened National Gallery of Art in Washing ton, D.C. By the early 1950s, the Foundation had donated numerous paintings to various regional galleries across
America, many in the South and West, where people did not have easy access to great collections of European art
(see Appendix A). Local museums were inspected to evaluate levels of interest and adequate facilities, but the overall aim was to offer them a well-balanced, represen tative survey of European art.4
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Once the selections for the National Gallery and the
regional galleries were settled, there remained 224 pic tures that were, for various reasons, deemed unsatisfac
tory for presenting to the general public. Nevertheless, they were still very valuable for academic purposes, so the Foundation created the Kress Study Collections for
colleges that had serious art history programs. By the
early 1960s, Kress Study Collections were established at universities and colleges in nineteen states and Puerto Rico, all of which were obliged to make the collections
fully accessible to students, scholars, and the public (see Appendix A for details).5 The University of Missouri-Co lumbia was one of the fortunate beneficiaries, receiving fourteen paintings to add to its collection.
The Museum of Art and Archaeology's dedication to offering this special collection to the public is reflected in its beautiful display, extended by allowing digital rep resentations of their Kress Study Collection for public access.
Methods and Tools
Digitizing the Images When digitizing images, one must consider the fact
that the demand for publicly accessible electronic images on the Web can conflict with the interests of the images' copyright holders. For instance, since digital images are
easy to download and manipulate, a simple text or copy right remark embedded in the image as text is insuffi cient. While copyright issues are complex and outside the scope of this paper, the authors were aware of such issues in planning the copyright notes for the database's
images. We restricted ourselves to embedded copyright text to avoid the potential delays of electronically watermarking the images, which creates a digital signal that is a constant, virtually unchangeable part of the im
age. An image is realized on the computer screen by mix
ing red, green, and blue pixels on a black background. The watermark uses the blue channel to add textual in formation about the copyright. The Art Institute of Chi
cago has a technique for watermarking that is among the most well-known, and is described at length in Alan Newman's and Raul Silva's "Creating a Digital Water mark."6
Once the copyright concerns had been settled, a de cision was needed on the best way to digitize the
Museum's slides, which, although of high quality, had to be scanned carefully to maintain this quality. There were
basically two possible resolution options: RGB (Red, Green, and Blue) or Indexed Colors. RGB offers an image represented with millions of colors and a high resolu
tion, whereas Indexed Colors uses only 256 colors with far less resolution. The Museum suggested Indexed Colors because the images could be viewed by users with lower resolution screens. This suggestion was followed, lead
ing next to the construction of the database.
Construction of the Database A relational database software (Microsoft Access) was
chosen that is readily available, has powerful capabili ties, and is widely used for relational data management. In order to appreciate the dynamics of Microsoft Access,
without going into tedious detail, a basic definition of the relational model is necessary. The relational model can basically be described as consisting of relations that are presented in two-dimensional tables. To create rela tions between tables, certain criteria are necessary. The cells of the table must be single valued, neither repeating groups nor arrays are allowed as values, and all the en tries in any column (attributes) must be of the same kind.
Moreover, each column has a unique name, and each row in a table must be unique as well.7
The power of the relational database model comes from the fact "that data is stored, at least conceptually, in a way that users can readily understand. Data is stored as tables, and relationships among rows of tables are vis ible in the data."8 This enables users to obtain informa tion from databases without the assistance of an experi enced database professional primarily because the data
relationships are represented clearly and obviously, not hidden or obscured in a system's index, as is often the case with non-relational models.9 In effect, relational da tabase programs such as Microsoft Access allow you to
actually see the relationships between information by having them presented logically and graphically, despite the fact that the information is stored in an intricate and
complex manner.
The relatively user-friendly characteristics of the re lational model offered by Microsoft Access were impor tant, since the users and future curators of the database
would be students and museum employees who might be more concerned with the images and data stored in the database rather than their technical organization. This fact led to our making the database as self-descriptive as
possible in content and structure, with the hope of mak
ing a "model of the user's model."10 The database consists of five different tables (see
Appendix A, part 2), organized according to the needs of the Museum. It was assumed that the Museum would
want accurate and easily retrievable information on its
holdings. Most of the tables ("Artists," "Title_Date,"
"Subject_Information," and "Physical_Data") were logi cally separated as general facets of a work, useful to the
Museum since various views of the database could be
presented in report form when necessary. The table hold
ing the full-text scholarly essays and the identifiers were created exclusively for Web searchability. The connect
ing element of all the tables ?the primary key? is the accession number. This is a unique identifier assigned to each piece of art the museum receives. Because it is unique to each work, and has a short numerical value, it was the
likely candidate for primary key. This key value must be included in each table, and must be unique since it is the
only element that allows all the tables to be related.
Regarding database management, however, the first and foremost concern was to avoid any normalization
problems, or problems that may arise when undesired
relationships occur due to poor database planning. In
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particular, modification anomolies (unintended loss of data during database modifications) can arise from not
clearly understanding how all the data are related and what implications such poor planning will have when modifications to the tables become necessary. By sepa rating our tables in their logical subject areas, and ensur
ing that there was a single tib?eme relating them, we made a database that could be easily modified and reviewed.
Other tools that helped to make the database more
user-friendly were forms and queries. Microsoft Access allows the easy creation of these to help accommodate
specific needs and make negotiating relational data less
complex. A form is an interface to a relational database that guides the user during the process of data entry and
modification in order to save time and make input more accurate. Also, with the help of different controls and
properties set by the database manager, the data can be
protected from misspellings or inaccurate entries. Que ries are essentially pre-defined, automated search and retrieval tools for a specific or related group of records
(e.g., a certain artist or all paintings of Italian origin). Since
queries present the results in their raw, unadorned state, programs like Microsoft Access also accommodate the creation of reports that can contain the same information in a more refined and organized form.
However, these locally created applications only serve the needs of a specific user group. Applications for remote users (indeed the world) require a markedly dif ferent approach, leading to issues and concerns of a much broader nature.
Web Accessibility Once the database was in its final form and met the
criteria of normalization, relation, content form, etc., we faced the task of making it Web accessible. There exist various and equally daunting programming languages and scripts that can be used for such an endeavor (CGI/ Perl, Java or Javascript, C++, etc.). We had already ex
perimented with a Microsoft Windows NT (v. 4.0) server and workstation, which includes a software package called Microsoft Peer Web Services. Among other options, this package has some fairly easy programs for publish ing databases on the Web. Although other similar server
softwares, such as Netscape's Live Wire or Oracle's Power
Browser, have recently become available, the NT server was at hand, easy to learn, and is both powerful and de
pendable. In the spirit of practicality and in keeping with the design of the course being taken, readily available local resources were utilized. Still, given that an indi vidual or small group can offer content to the world with
only a little effort and some up-to-date hardware and
software, such an astounding trend deserves to be exam
ined, even if only for experimentation. Microsoft's Peer Web Services was selected, as it offers
basic online database management, Web server manage ment (as well as FTP, Gopher, and Telnet), and Web pub lishing tools necessary for making a relational database (or other forms of data) Web accessible. The first step was to
register the locally stored database using a set of standards known as Open Database Connectivity (ODBC). In essence, a database is registered with ODBC through a simple step
by-step procedure. This includes assigning the database a
unique data source name that allows certain scripts to search an otherwise locally stored database.
Peer Web Services offers a scripting language to per form such searches, known as Internet Database Connec tor (IDC). This is unique to this software, although simi lar scripts are available in such systems as Oracle's Power Browser. IDC is rooted in Structured Query Language (SQL), the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) endorsed relational data-manipulation language that is the dominant standard for interchange of information between computers.11 Those who understand even basic
SQL will find a comfortable environment in IDC script ing. The path and file name of the IDC script can be ref erenced as the ACTION value in an HTML form (see Appendix B, Figure 1; Figure 2 is a sample IDC script from the Kress Study Collection Project).
Once the user clicks on the Submit button on the screen, the script is executed and asks the server to ac cess a database called Kress (the data source name as
signed when registering it with ODBC). The template artist.htx (discussed in more detail later) is used to for
mat the results so that they are presented as an HTML document viewable to the user. The IDC is more or less a vehicle that carries the SQLStatement to the database; it contains the search commands that look so similar to basic
SQL. This statement asks for everything to be selected from the table artist, where the field artistname is LIKE
whatever the input was from the HTML form. The man ner in which IDC employs the wildcard ('%') signs on either side of input may appear to be confusing, but is
really quite simple. One sign on either side indicates where the string variable from the HTML form is to be inserted in the SQLStatement, while the other two on ei ther side are the actual wildcards. They mean that the
input is now just a substring, so any data in artistname that contains this substring should be retrieved. (For ex
ample, if the input was "pica," and there was a data ele ment in this field called "Picasso, Pablo," "pica" would result in a hit.) The script is simple and effective, jsince it allows remote querying of SQL-driven databases.
Some added convenience is afforded by the
Hypertext Extension file, or HTX (see Appendix B, Fig
Screen no. 1: Artist or Title Search Page
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ure 3). This allows any or all portions of the retrieved results to be inserted into an HTML format. Basically, this can be as intricate an HTML document as one would like, with the returned values from the query inserted wher ever necessary This is a comprehensive tool, since it al lows the Web document to retain a consistent look be tween the form page and the results page in an appar ently seamless manner. (See Appendix B, Figure 3 for an
example of an HTX template that demonstrates how one can insert values into various places on a particular page.)
The implications of such Web accessibility tools, then, is that, once having learned the basics of SQL (and, hence, IDC), the HTML-based HTX, and having a locally stored relational database groomed with ODBC, one can have a
professional looking and remotely searchable database. The documentation of the Kress Collection is just such a database. Users can link to the page (from the parent museum's home page) containing the type of search they would like to perform, such as artist, title, or keyword search. By entering the artist's name, for example, or por tion of the name, all matching results are returned as
thumbnail images of the works related to that artist. Be low the thumbnail, the name of the artist and the itali cized title of the work of art are inserted, and a hypertext link under the name and title appears which invites the user to click it for a full-size picture and essay By click
ing on this link, the user initiates another IDC script that runs a separate query (using another HTX template) to return the full-sized photo and a scholarly essay of only the piece of art selected from the posting of the initial search. This is a visually appealing, Web-accessible cli ent to a database where content precedes form, but form enhances content.
The idea of responsible Web-authoring was a direct outcome of the experience of creating this Web site, in which the scripts worked and were aesthetically dis
played. This was a major feat, actually, since the authors are not computer scientists and all was essentially terra
incognita. While there was strong temptation to make a
flashy, image-intensive page into which the forms could be imbedded, we were forced to step back and recon sider the user. If the intention was to create an interface that allowed effective searching of the Museum's collec tion for both the novice and experienced user, then sur
rounding the basic information provided on the page with
unnecessary glitz would have been poor form. The page's essence consisted of a header ostensibly consistent with the Museum's home page (although it did not have a home page at the time this database was created), clear
navigational tools, the input forms themselves, and ba sic directions on the search page itself, as well as a link to
more detailed search instructions. This is all set on a back
ground neither dull nor garish, but a subtle, white marble that makes characters easier to recognize. Only the back
ground and navigational tools remain constant on the results pages, allowing either the thumbnail or full-size
picture to dominate the page while keeping a sense of still being in the same environment.
Discussion and Conclusion
Defining the Virtual Museum The way the term virtual museum has been tossed
around above is indicative of what we were trying to avoid in publishing content on the Web. It was even un clear throughout our work whether what we created would fall into this "catchy" category. However, relying on available literature and experience, we arrived at a clearer and more useful definition of virtual museum.
The virtual museum requires a look at the qualities and characteristics of the traditional museum. The differences between the two help us to better understand virtual mu
seums, but one should also consider the finest aspects of visual curatorship and emulate them in a digital environ ment. According to Hooper-Greenhill, a respected writer in the field of museums and education, the museum is de fined by the object or a collection of objects:
If there is a basic common function for museums, it is the acquisition, care and use of artifacts and speci
mens. This relationship to objects distinguishes muse ums from other kinds of institutions, although within
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this basic paradigm can be found an immense range of
positions in relation to communicative strategies.12
The object is the focus of the museum, although the communication of its character may vary. It is an exist
ing artifact that must be conserved for future generations, and displayed and explained to the public. To do this, the traditional museum houses its collection in a specific building that supports these needs. More important to this discussion, however, it is a place one must visit in order to experience the art. In contrast, the virtual mu seum is virtual because it does not exist in the physical
world, but only digitally. The virtual museum does not contain any physical objects, and lacks any definitive
position in space or time. These rudimentary criteria of
digital existence are the foundation for approaching a definition of the virtual museum.
The literature on virtual museums is predominantly enthusiastic, although many researchers describe virtual museums but do not define them. For example, McKenzie describes them as holding areas or digital emulations of a traditional museum:
A virtual museum is a collection of electronic arti
facts and information resources?virtually anything
which can be digitized. The collection may include paint
ings, drawings, photographs, diagrams, interviews, nu
merical databases, and a host of other items which may be saved on the virtual museum's file server. It may also
offer pointers to great resources around the world rel
evant to the museum's main focus.13
Although it is true that the virtual museum might contain the things described by McKenzie, it can go be
yond the mere reflection of real art on a two-dimensional
page. The virtual museum can also adapt traditional museum typology to information technology.14 Further
more, a virtual museum can offer a new kind of presen tation of information, something that Hoptman refers to as "connectedness." Connectedness is basic to the vir tual museum, as it seeks to describe the interrelated and
interdisciplinary presentation of museum information with the help of integrated media.15 It is, in fact, this qual ity that allows a virtual museum to transcend the capa bilities of the traditional museum. It can be realized, for
example, by displaying digital representations of art works next to comparative works by the same artist, art ists who have influenced him or her, or works of the same
style or period that are exhibited in museums at various
geographic locations or that are otherwise not normally accessible together. The potential to provide connected ness in a virtual museum also facilitates new forms of art that might not be integrated in traditional exhibitions, such as video art, interactive art, social sculpture, or ani
mations. Hoptman's concept of connectedness, coupled with the following statement, points to the value of the virtual museum:
The concept of the Virtual Museum demonstrates how limitations imposed by the traditional method of
organizing and presenting information can be over
come in the context of museum visits. In a nutshell,
the Virtual Museum provides multiple levels, perspec tives, and dimensions of information about a particu lar topic: it provides not only multimedia (print, vi sual images through photographs, illustrations or
video, and audio), but, more important, it provides information that has not been filtered out through these traditional methods.16
The most important thing to remember about con nectedness is that it lends itself to interactivity, where the visitor can focus on his or her special interests by pursu ing them in a sort of dialogue with the virtual museum.
At this point a reasonable and meartingful definition can perhaps be established: the virtual museum is a logi cally related collection of elements composed in a vari
ety of media, and, because of its capacity to provide con nectedness and various points of access, lends itself to
transcending traditional methods of communicating with the user; it has no real place or space, and dissemination of its contents is theoretically unbounded.
Currently, however, technology and hardware restric tions still place many practical restrictions on the virtual
museum. Today's technology (at least that available to the common user) can only provide pictures with rela
tively poor resolution, if one considers storage limitations and transmission time. Although it is difficult (and risky) to predict the future of technology, one can hope for ad vances in digital imaging, storage capacities, and client
capabilities, all of which will promote the virtual mu seum. But these advances could never, in many people's
minds, replace the experience of seeing an original work of art. This is an old conflict, seen throughout intellec tual history whenever technology appeared to be chang ing art or literature with new methods of dissemination or representation. Walter Benjamin recognized the unique problems involved in technological reproductions of art over sixty years ago, in his essay "The Work of Art in the
Age of Mechanical Reproduction":
Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and
space, its unique existence at the place where it hap
pens to be. This unique existence of the work of art
determined the history to which it was subject throughout the time of its existence.17
Benjamin further reflects on the special quality of the
original art work, stating "that which withers in the age of mechanical reproduction is the aura of the work of art."18 DiNicola, commenting on Benjamin, asks if this aura is also the critical point for digital representations of art works.19 This question remains unresolved although heatedly discussed at conferences and in the literature.
Opponents of the virtual museum argue that it is impos sible to adequately represent the original object. They deny that a digital environment can convey that aura re ferred to by Benjamin, and that the virtual museum is not an appropriate medium for presenting art.20 Support ers of the virtual museum concept emphasize that it can
present the object in a way that offers multi-sensory op portunities, like motion and sound, allowing a new ex
perience of the artwork.21 These are fervent debates that
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lie beyond the scope of this paper. The present role of the virtual museum is as a mediator between the public and the museum; its future holds interesting promise.
Hooper-Greenhill points out that new media like the virtual museum form part of the current transition of the traditional museum toward the museum of the future. The museum changes from being collection-driven to
being audience-driven. Museum publications are pro duced to relate to particular user groups and research itself includes an increasing focus on the visitors as well as the collections they visit.22 In this emerging user-cen tered model, the virtual museum can become an impe tus for increasing public interest in museums. As Noack
writes:
Museum educators often can't do their job until
people actually enter the museum, yet often their job is nothing more than getting people to the museum.
The Internet provides a means for them to do their job before people ever get near the museum.23
The virtual museum can serve as an easily accessible,
digital manifestation of the traditional museum, even
though it will never replace the actual, traditional mu seum. By bringing representations of objects into homes, we can allow users to define their own pathways to be
coming acquainted with art.
User Concerns and Content Responsibilities The new focus of museums, coupled with respon
sible Web authoring, is really a microcosm of the broader issues that arise in projects such as this one, for once the
euphoria of successfully negotiating the obstacles inher ent in creating a Web-accessible database has passed, larger and more serious concerns become apparent. It is not enough, as is so evident on the vanity-press-like Web
today, to simply build a visually attractive site. Rather, some fairly rigorous measures are needed to insure that the publication of information, whether virtual or real, is of a certain quality, consistency, and (certainly with re
gard to information searching and retrieval), that it is based on a user-driven philosophy.
Yet it is difficult to determine exactly who our users are, given the nature of the Web. Users visiting the mini virtual museum might be students, scholars, or any curi ous "surfers." The question is not whether to attempt to
appeal to each of these individuals or groups per se, but rather how to present content and to what degree. If one
purpose of the real museum is to educate, whether that be part of a formal curriculum or directed to the specific interests of an individual visitor, then education would
shape the creation of a virtual museum. A virtual museum can be one among many tools for
learning about art. Although it cannot replace the physi cal museum, it opens doors available only to the cyber searcher. As Mackenzie writes, "If, in response to a ques tion, the questioner is offered a pathway, this is the be
ginning of the educational process."24 Rudimentary ele ments in considering users involve insuring that the user,
regardless of orientation, realizes that the virtual museum is a step along the way to a destination, and recognizing
that an image received over the Internet is simply a rep resentation, not the genuine work of art. However, the virtual museum curator, so to speak, should also realize that the attempt to channel users is hubris. Beyond a state
ment of purpose on the page itself, and perhaps a profil ing element (albeit from a user-centered philosophy that neither restricts nor confuses) on the initial page, we should let the beholders look and learn what they will, and enjoy the fact that the page is noticed.
Since one of the loudest cries against the Web is the lack of substantive content, the virtual museum curator should not exacerbate this situation by posting incom
plete or inaccurate material. Clearly, not even a novice searcher will be convinced that a small digital image can
properly depict a piece of art, and the day when digital imagery will afford a quality that can even approach veri similitude is still very far off. Nevertheless, whatever is offered to the cyber-world should be as accurate as pos sible and properly maintained. As copyright issues and the changing nature of information in this area of explod ing hypermedia are still under discussion, displaying accurate content is not always as clear-cut a task as in the
physical world. But it is not a terribly taxing endeavor to
simply post what is worthy, and avoid putting up an
noying "Under Construction" signs. In the Kress Collection project, the highest quality
images available were used, which are not too large to store on an average server and are easily transmitted. It is obvious that no one should or can use these for brush stroke analysis or for any other serious scholarship on the work. Moreover, the scholarly text was entered for each piece only after the approval of the museum's cura
tors, and with the understanding that any changes in
scholarship will be incorporated into the site as soon as available.
It is not just a courtesy but a professional responsi bility that the same care should be extended to the Web version of a collection as would be to the physical. The site is, after all, not only a reflection of the museum, but has the potential of being accessed by far more visitors.
Conclusion The Kress Study Collection Project, even in its cur
rent prototype state, points to the possibilities for mak
ing new collections without building new museums. As
stated, the Kress Foundation has donated numerous works to a variety of museums. Even if these widely dis
persed collections are only unified by the fact that they share the same benefactor, the prospect that they can be studied as a whole is made possible only through the
Web. Naturally, this is possible for myriad collections with more specific common themes, or for temporary exhibi tions developed by virtual curators and art scholars. The
point is that the technology of the Web can increase ac cess to and awareness of art in general, particularly to
relatively unrecognized collections. The virtual museum is a new home for masterpieces, and it invites a new breed of electronic curators to open its doors.
Volume 17, Number 1 ? 1998 ? Art Documentation 25
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12. Eilean Hooper-Greenhill, "Museum education: past, present and future." Towards the Museum of the Future. New European Perspec tives. Ed. Roger Miles and Lauro Zavala. (London/New York:
Routledge, 1994): 135.
13. Jamie McKenzie, "Virtual Museums: Full of Sound and Fury,"
Bellingham Public Schools Home Page. Version undated, http:// www.bham.wednet.edu/muse.htm. Accessed November 11,1997.
14. Wendy R. Bennett, "The Virtual Museum - Probing a Future
Program - A Thesis Proposal." Version 1/30/96. http://
dolphin.upenn.edu/~wrben/thesis.htm. Accessed November 11,1996.
15. Glen H. Hoptman, "The Virtual Museum and Related Episte
mologica! Concerns." Sociomedia: Multimedia, Hypermedia, and the Social
Construction of Knowledge. Ed. Edward Barrett. (Cambridge, MA.: MIT
Press, 1992):143.
16. Ibid., 146.
17. Walter Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical
Reproduction." Illuminations. Walter Benjamin - Essays and Reflections.
Ed. Hannah Arendt. (New York: Schocken Books, 1985): 220.
18 Ibid., 221.
19 M. Travis DiNicola, "The Work of Walter Benjamin in the Age of Digital Reproduction." Version undated, http://cac.psu.edu/
~mtdl20/palmer/thesis/benjamin.html. Last visited 11/11/96.
20. Herman Sch?fer, "Use and Embedding of Interactive Media in
a Museum of Contemporary History." Hands on Hypermedia and
Interactivity in Museums. Selected Papers from the Third International Con
ference on Hypermedia and Interactivity in Museums (ICHIM '95 - MCN
'95) San Diego, California October 9-13,1995. Ed. David Bearman. (Pitts
burgh, PA.: Archives and Museum Informatics, 1995): 70-85.
21. See note 13 above.
22. Eilean Hooper-Greenhill: 134.
23. David R. Noack, "Visiting Museums Virtually. See the
Smithsonian and Vatican in the Same Day. A Bonanza of Museum Trea
sures Around the World Are But a Mouse Click Away." I-World Online.
Version October 1995. http://pubs.iworld.com/iw-online/Oct95/ museums.html. Accessed November 15,1996.
24. Douglas MacKenzie, "Using Archives for Education," Journal
of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia 5, no.2 (1996): 115.
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