From Inception to Interface: Ontologies, Data Modelling, and Linked Data for Online Exhibition-Making

Abstract

Beyond the Book: A digital journey through the treasures of the Emmerson Collection is an online exhibition composed of several, interconnected parts – prose, images, photogrammetry and data. To create the site, we experimented with a new methodology for online exhibition-making: using the cultural heritage ontology, the CIDOC CRM, we modelled, created and published Linked Data related to the John Emmerson Collection. As well as communicating context within the exhibition, this data encodes it a durable form, in a way that can be repurposed and integrated into collection catalogues. In this article, we discuss the process of experimenting with this method for online-exhibition-making as well as the challenges of drawing on data to create an online exhibition from inception to interface.