Do you remember Dusty, the vacuum cleaner robot that explored a model version of the Glyptothek during this spring’s COVID19 related lockdown? This summer Dusty was able to experience the real Glyptothek, using its somewhat limited artificial intelligence, basically trying to avoid obstacles on its way through the maze of shelves full of plaster casts.
The Glyptothek of the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, is a collection
of plaster casts dating back to the late 17th century. Its main task was to serve as study material for Academy students, containing copies of a canon of world renown sculptures, ranging from plaster casts of Egyptian originals to copies of Greek and Roman, medieval, renaissance and historism statues. This collection of copies of works of art can be seen as an early analog blueprint of digital collections: the Glyptothek made the essence of European sculpture available to local audiences, who could enjoy international pieces of art without leaving their home town, very much like today‘s internet population can access digital images of the world‘s artistic heritage at the click of their handheld device.
Speaking of digital images, the above image of Dusty in the Glyptothek actually is a digital copy of an analog photograph, which in itself is an analog copy of a plaster cast which is a copy of a statue which is a copy of a real (or imagined) person …
