2 Columbus Circle (on the right), day view (Photo: New York Times)

The 1964 Gallery of Modern Art at 2 Columbus Circle is being transformed into a new space for the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD). Almost everything about the building has changed, but the original “lollipop” columns persist. The New York Times has put an interactive feature online, providing an animated overview of the building’s redesign. Moreover, on the MAD-website you can watch a video of the construction works.

Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) Floor plan: new vs. old situation (Photo: New York Times)

The Iraqi National Museum has reclaimed 701 artefacts that were stolen during looting in the aftermath of the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003. The news was covered by media from around the world:

Stolen treasures returned to Iraq’s museum (People’s Daily Online, 29 Apr 2008)

Treasures returned to Iraq museum (Kazinform, 28 Apr 2008)

Stolen treasures returned to Iraq’s museum (Sydney Morning Herald, 28 Apr 2008)

Iraqi museum receives 701 artifacts stolen during looting (Aljazeera.com, 27 Apr 2008)

Treasures returned to Iraq museum (BBC, 27 Apr 2008)

Iraqi National Museum receives 701 artifacts stolen in wake of Saddam Hussein’s ouster (International Herald Tribune, 27 Apr 2008)

Baghdad museum receives artifacts stolen from Iraq (Washington Post, 27 Apr 2008)

Read more Baghdad Museum news (The Baghdad Museum Project)

The Rijksmuseum Amsterdam has just released its collection widget 3.0. Web Man Peter Gorgels alerted me of their new application, and we are more than happy to show you the fully functional Rijkswidget 3.0.

It is an interesting and clever feature that shows a daily piece of the vast collection of the Rijksmuseum. The widget can be embedded in blogs, Hyves, Facebook and MySpace. It is elegantly designed, and can be blown up; however it would have been nice if you could flip endlessly through the collections, instead of having to wait for tomorrow. Maybe an idea for 4.0?

Update:
This is actually the small version, to be placed in sidebars. This is what we will do for a month, to see how it works. Let us know what you think of this initiative of our friends at the Rijksmuseum.

Here is a blatant quote from Mike Ellis‘ electronicmuseum.org.uk, but since he has such a simple and straightforward conclusion of MW2008 I wanted to copy it entirely.

Ellis just spent 7 years working as Head of Web for the National Museum of Science and Industry, UK, which comprises the Science Museum in London, Media Museum in Bradford and Railway Museum in York. He now calls himself a «Solutions Architect», working for the Professional Services Group at Eduserv.

Please visit his site, he is an authority on many things, and might even come from the future.

This is Mike’s «direction of travel gut feel for what actually went on during the week:

• We’re doing some very cool stuff using some great new approaches and technologies.
• We’re starting to see the benefits of open access to our content, both in terms of Creative Commons and programmatic access via API’s or syndication.
• We’re - at last - worrying less and doing more.
• We’re beginning to see the benefits of community, not just the coolness.
• Finally: we’re up for collaborating and sharing in more open and positive ways than ever before.»

The keynote speaker of last week’s Museums and the Web in Montreal Michael Geist is looking back at the conference with a critical article in the Toronto Star. In short, Geist summons Canada’s museums to remove fees and contractual barriers to Canadian heritage.

«The dozens of presentations at the conference highlighted the remarkable transformation in how museums display their collections and interact with the public.»

He goes on to say that «(m)any museums are using online video, social networks and interactive multimedia to pull content from diverse places to create «virtual museums.» So, the museum community has emerged as a leading voice for the development of legal frameworks to facilitate digitization and avoid restrictions that could hamper cultural innovation.»

Yet, according to Geist, who holds the Canada research chair in Internet and e-commerce law at the University of Ottawa faculty of law, «some fear the advocacy and actions of museums in embracing the Internet are not consistent, particularly in their policies on works for which copyright has expired.»

According to documents obtained by Geist under the Access to Information Act, the National Gallery of Canada appears to be treating public-domain works as a profit centre.

«(T)he gallery often added hundreds of dollars to the total cost of fulfilling a request, despite the fact that the images were in the public domain. In fact, the permission costs for such works were actually higher than those for works still subject to copyright. The gallery reasoned that the copyright holder would apply additional charges.»

Read his full article (Toronto Star, April 15, 2008)
Visit Michael Geist’s homepage

The final day of the conference is on its way. This morning we had quite a rewarding demonstration of the n8 strategy, explaining our on and off line activities. It is interesting to see so many institutions working with all these interesting and intelligent tools, but not many working collectively in a city or region, like we do in Amsterdam. I would be keen to learn from other organisations that develop plans together. The collective of over 40 museums in Amsterdam have founded the n8 as an innovation platform for youth marketing, event organisation and new media development. Our annual Museum Night is by far the most known of the projects we do, but the Museum in MP3 portal is getting some good feedback, amongst others from the kind people at MoMA and ICA Boston. I would love to discuss this more in depth with attendees of MW2008.

Day two of MW2008 began at 8 am this morning, with the ‘Birds of a Feather’ breakfast. Our self-created table ‘Enhanced Museum Events’ inspired an interesting dialogue with Jonathan Bowen, who is presenting Wiki Software and Facilities for Museums in the midday session. Before that, I visited talks about Web 2.0 Metrics by the ever enthusing Seb Chan, and Web 2.0 tools by David Greenfield from the Loyola Marymount Universit.

The afternoon schedule brings a much anticipated and needed discussion on openness, by ’solutions architect’ Mike Ellis and Brian Kelly. Hopefully there will be time for lunch and more in-between-the-lines-discussions about the Semantic Web, public-private-ventures and enhancing actual museum visits by means of ultranew media.

Due to rather unfortunate circumstances I have not been able to send in my paper to MW2008; however the organisation has been kind enough to give us a slot at the demonstrations on Saturday. If you are interested to hear about the Amsterdam Museum Night, physical museum events and interactive media, social networking in the context of a museum festival and other ‘interreality’ examples, join us tomorrow at 9.30 am at booth 16.

The 12th edition of the annual Museums and the Web conference has started today. Keynote speaker Michael Geist, law professor at the University of Ottawa where he holds the Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-commerce Law, had an interesting talk at the opening plenary, stressing the need for museums to take responsibility for shaping the future Web.

Like every year, the conference is as cluttered and complex as the topics it addresses. Chairman and MW evangelist David Bearman admits it himself, advising visitors to ‘browse’ the lectures instead of fanatically trying to absorb all of its contents. This mornings’s program consists of sessions entitled ‘Personalisation’, ‘Engaging Museum Audiences’ and ‘Theoretical Frameworks’. After lunch, themes are a.o. ‘Mobile Computing’, User-Generated Content’ and ‘What to do with New Media Art?’.

MW2008

A computer simulation of Saadiyat island in Abu Dhabi, where a new Guggenheim outpost will be part of a “cultural district.” (Photo: DPA/Spiegel Online)

In a recent SPIEGEL interview, the departing director of the New York- based Guggenheim Foundation, Thomas Krenz, talks frankly about the Guggenheim’s future outpost in Abu Dhabi. Calling it the “first museum for global contemporary art” and “a truly new step in the evolution of the art museum”, he even uses the term ‘pharaonic’ to describe the vast scale of the project. The exuberant design by Frank Gehry will occupy almost 42.000 square meters and will get a $781 million budget to acquire contemporary works of art.

After telling that the Guggenheim Foundation cannot afford the convenience, the luxury, of simply copying something we already have, he cofesses that by asking Frank Gehry once more to duplicate the ‘Bilbao-effect’, the museum could get into troubles: “It’s as if you, as a director, were shooting the action film ‘Die Hard’ and then ‘Die Hard II’. By the second or third time around, it becomes more difficult to surprise people.”

However, according to Krens the project is too important for Abu Dhabi, and for the Guggenheim Foundation to fail. He defends himself against the insinuations by the SPIEGEL journalist that the museum will merely become a tourist-hub and will be just another McGuggenheim-outlet by telling that he asked Frank Gehry to design a truly unique building with the breathtaking effect of the first cathedrals in medieval times. It remains to be seen whether this analogy will work in a Middle Eastern country.

Read the entire interview (Spiegel Online, March 27, 2008)
Read the latest news on the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi

Both editors of MuseumLab are currently attending the Musee 2.0 symposium at the Centre Pompidou in Paris. Speakers include (a.o.) Peter Weibel (director ZKM, Karlsruhe), John Stack (director, Tate Online, London) and Alain Depocas (director Fondation Daniel Langlois, Montreal). You can watch their presentations via a live feed on their website.