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- Digital painting: AI will help track the fate of the Hermitage collections
Digital painting: AI will help track the fate of the Hermitage collections
Russian scientists have developed a cloud-based archive database Hermitage 1812 with elements of artificial intelligence, which combines all available information about the exhibits of the Hermitage. So far, it includes information about the part of the museum's collection that was evacuated from St. Petersburg during the invasion of Napoleon. But the creators plan to expand it further. The system is already available to everyone and allows you to organize records and find new connections in the history of works of art. According to art historians, this is a valuable research tool that would be useful to scale to the entire museum fund of the country.
Archived data base with AI
The new cloud database of archival materials Hermitage 1812, which was created by scientists of the Moscow State University Faculty of History, combines information about works of art that were evacuated from the Hermitage during the invasion of Napoleon. The system brings together disparate records about the exhibit into a single work card, compares the information with each other and tracks the entire history of changes down to pencil marks in the margins. According to the developers, it solves the problem of heterogeneity of historical archival data and already helps researchers to systematize them effectively, as well as to find new connections between sources.
— Even differences in case, punctuation, or pre-reform spelling could create false duplicates, and catalog numbers could not always be matched automatically. In the future, the database will be replenished with other works from the 1812 collection and thematic blocks from different periods. And most importantly, the white spots that currently exist in our knowledge of the history of the exhibits will be closed," said Maxim Mironenko, a specialist in educational and methodological work at the Moscow State University Faculty of History.
The evacuation from the Hermitage in 1812 was the first operation in the museum's history to save collections, conducted in the strictest secrecy. When the threat of Napoleon's troops attacking the capital arose, the most valuable exhibits were collected and sent inland so that they would not fall into enemy hands.
The database is based on research materials by Liya Okroshidze, Senior Inspector of the Moscow State University Faculty of History. For three years, in the Scientific Archive of Manuscripts and the Documentary Fund of the State Hermitage Museum, she consistently studied the lists of paintings sent to the evacuation in 1812, where the works were designated solely by numbers, without specifying names and authors.
— All of the paintings that were evacuated have been processed. However, the location of some works is unknown. At the time of 1812, almost 1/5 of all paintings from the Hermitage collection had been removed. There are millions of items in the museum, so compared to today, this is a small part of the collection," Liya Okroshidze told Izvestia.
The numbers from the evacuation lists were compared with old inventories, inventories of the XVIII–XX centuries and modern catalogs. Some of the works were searched by inventory marks, plots and engravings, as well as by size comparison. This made it possible to restore the composition of the works evacuated from the Hermitage, their fate and current location, the historian explained.
— Raphael's Judith appears in the evacuation inventories, but there is no such work in the modern Hermitage collection. By comparing the dimensions according to the 1797 catalog, historians were able to compare the record with the images of Judith that actually exist in the museum. The search led to the Giorgione painting: the work simply changed attribution — what was considered Raphael at the end of the 18th century was later recognized as the work of another master," Lia Okroshidze gave an example.
The project is a web application, and the data is stored in a cloud database that aggregates hundreds of records from tables with different structures. Built-in analytics instantly generates statistics on the location of works, materials, and sources. This transforms the archive from a static list into a working tool. In addition to the usual filters, an AI assistant is integrated into the system.
Digitization of the collection
A significant part of the collection has been digitized in the Hermitage itself. At the moment, the museum's open database includes information on more than 1.2 million works. However, these systems are noticeably different from each other. Although, according to the creators of Hermitage 1812, in the future, the data digitized by the Hermitage can be included in their system, which has great analytical capabilities.
— We provide a research tool that allows you to trace the authorship and history of objects and their owners. We would be happy to combine our databases so that they also have a visual component," said Maxim Mironenko.
According to the candidate of Art History, curator Sergey Uvarov, the AI mechanism is still imperfect, and the information in the cards clearly requires the attention of an editor or at least a proofreader. There are not enough images of works in development, although it is not difficult to make them pull up automatically from open sources.
— But the direction of the work itself seems very correct. The systematization of information about museum objects, especially if different sources are involved, is an urgent and important task. The question is how scalable this development is. Let's say it currently covers 575 subjects and focuses on one episode of the story. Is it possible in the future to expand it to all evacuations, and then to all movements? That would be very relevant," he said.
This development may be important not only for the Hermitage, but also for the entire Museum Fund of the Russian Federation, and potentially in demand all over the world, says art critic and NTI expert Elizaveta Krypaeva.
— The database will allow you to trace the entire history of movements and attribution of works over the past years, not only by the name of the artist or the name of the workshop or manufactory, but also by the inventory number. This will help to significantly narrow down the search range when establishing the authorship of a particular work. In addition, the resource will be useful for researchers studying the history of the formation and movement of museum collections," she believes.
If in the future the project covers museums all over Russia, as well as attracts private collectors who are willing to share data about their collections, it can become one of the most convenient working tools for art historians, Elizaveta Krypaeva emphasized.
According to Yaroslav Seliverstov, a leading expert in the field of AI at University 2035, the developed architecture is versatile and scalable, which opens up opportunities for digitization and intelligent analysis of the multimillion-dollar collections of the Hermitage and other museums around the world. In the future, the project can become the basis of a global ecosystem of digital cultural heritage, turning archival collections into an interactive tool for researchers, teachers and a wide audience, as well as offering new approaches to the study of art history.
Переведено сервисом «Яндекс Переводчик»
