Extending Exhibitions to Historical Journeys through Data [in the Semantic Web]
Marcia Zeng, Kent State University, USA, Jonathan Ward, J. Paul Getty Trust, USA, Gregg Garcia, J. Paul Getty Trust, USA
With the available Linked Open Data (LOD) on geographic names (historical and current) and related information, many exhibitions (physical or virtual) for cultural objects can benefit from them and extend the discovery journeys through data. This forum brings developers of the Getty Thesaurus for Geographic Names (TGN, which lists hundreds of thousands of places significant in art and cultural history and was published along with three other Getty vocabularies as LOD) as well as the researchers in information science and geographic information systems to talk about the use cases, innovative approaches, potentials, and barriers. The examples of such innovative ideas include exploring the Silk Road with the 21st-century way via the TGN, in relation to the Cave Temples of Dunhuang: Buddhist Art on China’s Silk Road exhibition held at the Getty Center in 2016. The management and further development of TGN, the technical supports of LOD TGN at the back-end, and its front-end services together form a complete package that demonstrate the methods and practical issues. In exploring the use of TGN in online exhibitions and web portals of cultural objects, the connections of historical place names with the geographic information systems will also be discussed.
Bibliography:
Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names® Online, available at: http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/vocabularies/tgn/