Slashdot Mirror
Artist Uses 3D Printing To Preserve Artifacts Destroyed By ISIS
tedlistens writes: "From the burning of the Library of Alexandria to the destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan in Afghanistan by the Taliban, to the Nazi's battle to burn as much "degenerate art" as they could find, mobs and soldiers have been quick to destroy what took societies centuries to create; what museums and collectors spent decades collecting, preserving, and documenting for the public." However, as noted by Motherboard in an article to which tedlistens links, "The digital era looks different: files can be cheaply hosted in data centers spread across several states or continents to ensure permanence. Morehshin Allahyari, an Iranian born artist, educator, and activist, wants to apply that duplicability to the artifacts that ISIS has destroyed. Now, Allahyari is working on digitally fabricating the sculptures for a series called "Material Speculation" as part of a residency in Autodesk's Pier 9 program. The first in the series is "Material Speculation: ISIS," which, through intense research, is modeling and reproducing statues destroyed by ISIS in 2015. Allahyari isn't just interested in replicating lost objects but making it possible for anyone to do the same: Embedded within each semi-translucent copy is a flash drive with Allahyari's research about the artifacts, and an online version is coming.
Low-resolution copies of the originals does not help preserve the originals.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
And if ISIS were to kill Will Weaton, that is OK since I have his Wesley Crusher action figure.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
I'm afraid that willfull, destructive ignorance and barbarism isn't a problem that technology can solve. A digital copy, however perfect, remains a copy, and by nature, can't be used as proof that there ever *was* an original, which is the entire purpose of ISIS's destruction of these relics.
I don't mean to denigrate these efforts. I mean, I'm really glad to see some part of these works preserved, but... Human lives are transient, and we weep at senseless killing, but one thing humans can do to achieve a bit of immortality is to leave behind a long-lasting legacy of culture and art. ISIS is not only insistent on killing people in the present. Destroying these artifacts is like killing artists' legacies from the past as well.
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
That doesn't really preserve the originals, you're just making copies of them. There are hundreds of thousands of Mona Lisa's in the world, but they are all worth nothing compared to the original. I really don't mean to discourage these efforts, it's a good idea, but it's not "preserving artifacts destroyed by ISIS", it's "distributing copies of things destroyed by ISIS". Copies are not going to pacify my loathing for this terrible organization - these people deserved to be burned alive just like the people they've killed, and I'm very rarely one to talk about extremes.
"Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
It seems to me that if museums, as a matter of course, scan and extensively photograph all new inventory as well as old inventory -- and put the data on the interwebs -- that will provide some protection from the pigshit known as ISIL as well as other semi-human garbage. It would generate a lot of data, but these days that seems pretty cheap.
Part of the problem is that, although it is possible for museums from stable nations to storehouse collections from museums in unstable regions, the practical end result could be that those regions would be unable to show artefacts for decades or centuries. Further, if an official from semi-civilized country Y says, "give us back our junk", who is authorized to say yes or no, even if the purpose of getting stuff back is to destroy it? As I understand it, even now, items in museums in stable democracies are being returned to the country from which they were were taken, because those countries are asking for them back. Scanning such items before returning them at least provides the possibility to make a backup in case the original is damaged or destroyed.
what do you mean "when" didnt you see all the outrage over the draw a cartoon rally from last week??? the left was saying they deserved to die for drawing a cartoon.... i mean come on
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Not "the left", any more than "the right" are all free market fundamentalists who bomb abortion clinics.
Some morons who claim to represent the left say this. They are people the rest of "the left" think of as "fuckwits".
yeah, it's not perfect, but he's actually DOING something.
From the article:
These people (that is, the extremists) honestly believe they can make this Orwellian fantasy come true in the digital age? Sure, the world will lose a lot of precious artifacts, but information can't be destroyed - and that's withOUT people like Allahyari acting to resurrect those artifacts. The world needs more people like him.
*shakes head*
... or he'll probably get busy with a 3-D printer, write some inane bit of blather on postcards, and start selling these for millions.
#DeleteChrome
To clarify and expand:
'the left' and 'the right' are the people the rest of everyone think of as 'fuckwits.'
Don't kid yourself. A lot of people throughout history have thought 'we really have figured it all out. now we just need to ram our rules through and the world will be better.' The flavor varies, but not much else.
some would make the argument that the 2 are not the same. (not me, but some)
one involves the ending of a (potential) human life, the other...is drawing a cartoon....
Not really the same
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
The artefacts can not be preserved digitally, once they are gone they are gone for good, everything else is a cheap copy.
Which sums up the digital world... "cheap copy".
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
The original work may have special value since it was made by the original artist.. but.. sometimes these marvelous works are not suitable for handling/experiencing by interested parties. a book from the middle ages is probably going to be untouchable by Joe Public, but an exact duplicate on modern paper might be read by more people. I am FAR from approving of destruction of original works... That has been done by so many groups over time. so... Lets start duplicating objects of art so the destruction of the original does not mean much to the miscreants. Less motive to destroy original if there are many copies!!
Time for a new Political party in the US (or two!) One is off the rails Other cant pony up a leader.
to the Nazi's battle to burn as much "degenerate art" as they could find
The "degenerate art" removed from the museums headed in all sorts of directions,
Hitler used to use Baedeker travel guides as a guide to what should be destroyed, although a famous library in the Netherlands was bombed at the start of the war "just because". After the Allies (ok, the British) destroyed a few German cultural spots of neglible military value, the Luftwaffe was sent to destroy highlights selected from Baedeker such as Coventry Cathedral.
There were two Warsaw uprisings, the Jewish one and then later - with the Soviets approaching - the Polish one. As revenge for the second one, buildings were blown up in the order of their ranking in the Warsaw Baedeker - best to worst. The Soviets ceased their advance and waited for the Nazis to suppress the uprising before resuming operations. That is one of the factors behind the Polish attitude to Russia, Katyn being another big one.
With ISIS (I thought it was ISIL) now starting to operate in Saudi Arabia, I wonder if Islamic sites are in danger. One would think not but I had not expected the recent suicide bombings either.
Mielipiteet omiani - Opinions personal, facts suspect.
Bravo!