A conference on the quality of digital media and techniques The EVA (Electronic Media and Visual Arts) conference took place for the 22nd time at the beginning of November at the Berlin Museum of Decorative Arts. This annual gathering of users, developers and mediators of electronic documentation and communication techniques has been held at an international level for 26 years, with venues such as London, Florence, Moscow and Jerusalem […]

A conference on the quality of digital media and techniques

The EVA (Electronic Media and Visual Arts) conference took place for the 22nd time at the beginning of November at the Berlin Museum of Decorative Arts. This annual gathering of users, developers and mediators of electronic documentation and communication technologies has been held at an international level for 26 years, with venues including London, Florence, Moscow and Jerusalem. Even if the focus changes from year to year, the EVA conference, with its seismographic recording of technical trends, has become an integral part of the cultural sector.

While in recent years the focus has been on the development of 3D technologies or the digitalization of soundscapes, this year’s conference focused on the quality of digital media and technologies. A wide range of questions relating to visualization, digitization and staging were discussed in lectures and workshops. How unique are works of art if they can be perfectly reproduced or scanned in high resolution? What possibilities does this open up for everyday museum life? What is it like to live in a “smart city”? Electronic documentation and visualization techniques in the cultural sector were presented and discussed in a practical way.

For example, the Fraunhofer Institute for Computer Graphics Research in Darmstadt presented the spectacular 3D visualization of the Pergamon Altar. In a record time of just one week, the entire altar was captured in 47 scan positions with 180 million generated pixels. The post-processing of the data naturally required an enormous amount of personnel and technical effort, but the result is a technical masterpiece that will delight the public. Will this set the standard for future projects of this kind? The work has not yet been completed and will be presented to the public at the beginning of next year.

Elisabeth Markevitch, who has created a user-friendly tool for designing exhibition spaces with her “IkonoSpace” software, showed that three-dimensional digital techniques can be a great help in curatorial and restoration work. Joachim Weinhold, a mathematician (3-D laboratory at the Institute of Mathematics at TU Berlin), described the exciting reconstruction of the foot of an Achilles sculpture in the tea room of the Berlin City Palace using 3-D printing.

Will digital technology replace the “analog” museum? Dr. Andreas Bienert from the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (SMB) does not see this danger. Rather, the complexity of perceptual possibilities and the new digital representations would complement the haptic museum offer. Bienert has been the initiator and organizer of the conference, which always attracts top-class speakers, for many years and advocates open and open-minded communication between technical experts and cultural partners. In his opinion, the EVA events are legitimized and justified by interdisciplinarity and mutual exchange.

With almost 200 visitors this year, he draws a positive conclusion from EVA Berlin 2015, noting that in addition to the presentation of technical innovations, there has recently been an interest from political and cultural institutions in questions of culture and computer science. Unfortunately, this is also due to the disturbing reality of the major destruction of cultural heritage in the Middle East, said Bienert on the fringes of the exciting conference.

The comprehensive conference proceedings are available to download free of charge on the EVA platform.
You can find an interview on the significance of the conference in today’s academic world here.

STEIN presents a photo gallery featuring historic tombs from France’s third-largest cemetery.

The mausoleums are falling into disrepair, while the urn fields are expanding

The Cimetière Saint-Pierre is one of the newer cemeteries of its kind: it was established in 1855 and officially inaugurated eight years later. Previously, the people of Marseille buried their loved ones in smaller parish, monastery, or hospital cemeteries—or at the central Saint-Charles Cemetery. Located in the city center, the latter quickly ran out of space and was permanently closed in 1876. Saint-Pierre replaced it, covering an area of 63 hectares.

At first glance, this seems overwhelming. But visitors quickly find their bearings by following the greenery: wherever pine trees grow on small slopes, they are sure to find the historic burial sites. Dozens of renowned French entrepreneurs and artists—including painters, sculptors, and singers—are buried here. Among them is the composer Vincent Scotto. He wished for the following epitaph: “All my life I have composed; today I am decaying.” However, it never came to pass—Scotto’s wife deemed this final wish inappropriate.

Saint-Pierre stands as a striking testament to the changing funeral culture in our neighboring country as well. Extraordinary—and above all, an extraordinary number of—mausoleums, sculptures, and funerary monuments commemorate the cemetery’s heyday—even if some of them are now aging and falling into disrepair in a regrettable state. Huge urn burial grounds down the hillside serve as their modern counterpart.

In total, around 150 employees now work at the cemetery, which contains 100,000 graves. Unusual to German eyes are the cars that, while not numerous, do pass through regularly. Saint-Pierre has a road network totaling 15 kilometers. In Marseille, too, the city administration is working to find solutions for the changing face of cemeteries. Among other initiatives, it has launched grave sponsorship programs and is attempting to catalog as many of the graves as possible in an online database. There is an interactive terminal at the cemetery (and also at the 20 others scattered throughout the city). Interested visitors can use it to search for the graves of famous people—or to find that of a relative on the vast grounds.


The editorial team will continue the series “Impressions from the Cemetery” at irregular intervals—and welcomes suggestions and requests via email to redaktion@stein-magazin.de