ORDEA – Open Research Data Environments for the Arts

Although researchers have access to an increasing number of digital resources supplied by archives, collections, and museums, the potential for analyzing and reusing Cultural Heritage data has not yet been fully exploited. The ORDEA project seeks to provide a comprehensive framework that simplifies and streamlines the production, re-use, and publication of research and collection data for Art History and related disciplines. Furthermore, ORDEA expands research opportunities with Linked Open Data technology (LOD) and with computational methods. It provides tools and practices enabling researchers to examine, align, enhance, and share data based on semantic technology, with little to no prior knowledge of data modelling and data analysis.

The ORDEA project, funded by swissuniversities, was initiated by the University of Zurich (Swiss Art Research Infrastructure, SARI), ETH Zurich (gta Institute), the University of Basel (Digital Humanities Lab, DHLab) and the University of Bern.

Today, archives, collections, and museums provide a growing number of digitized resources. However, the potential use of research and collection data in the field of Cultural Heritage, Art History, and other related disciplines is still underdeveloped. In particular, the re-use of research and collection data according to the FAIR principles remains a challenge. The ORDEA project thus aims to enable unified and mutual access to digital resources by providing domain-specific Semantic Reference Data Models (SRDM). Such SRDMs are based on international standards for semantic data, ontologies, and their extensions for Cultural Heritage data. ORDEA also offers a range of tools and practices that make it easier for researchers to produce, visualize, analyze, and re-use research data.

The ORDEA framework includes:

1. Tools and practices for re-using and adapting complex semantic data models and ontologies, such as CIDOC-CRM and its extensions
2. Tools and practices for aligning data with Linked Open Data resources (LOD)
3. Tools and workflows for data integration
4. Tools and practices for analyzing and enhancing semantic Cultural Heritage data with Computer Vision and Machine Learning

The ORDEA framework allows researchers to re-use and adapt semantic data models to their own needs and share them with little to no prior knowledge of semantic data modelling. The production, alignment, and publication of research data follow common standards and practices so that the researcher’s data become interoperable with third-party data, especially with collection data from the GLAM sector. Researchers gain further insights from their data with the help of computational analysis of visual artefacts and the representation in a Knowledge Graph. 

The ORDEA project, funded by swissuniversities, was initiated by the University of Zurich (Swiss Art Research Infrastructure, SARI), ETH Zurich (gta Institute), the University of Basel (Digital Humanities Lab, DHLab) and the University of Bern.

A main challenge consists in the interoperability of research and collection data and the lack of joint ontological foundations. Moreover, easy-to-use toolkits and methods are missing, which support researchers in re-using and extending existing semantic data models to make their research data interoperable with the Linked Open Data universe.

ORDEA aims at facilitating the re-use and interoperability of research and collection data in accordance with the FAIR principles and improving existing ORD practices. Its framework also seeks to enhance computer-aided research methods by developing practices for linking Computer Vision analysis with semantic data and Knowledge Graphs.

To improve the research potential of digital resources and existing ORD practices, ORDEA provides a framework of Semantic Data Reference Models (SRDM, version 2), tools, and methods including: 

• Extensions to the CIDOC-CRM ontology, covering the specific requirements of Art and Architectural history, and related disciplines
• An updated version of the SRDMs, providing reusable modelling patterns, domain-specific entities, and use cases
• A new platform, called Zellij, for documenting, re-using, adopting, and publishing SDRMs, as to enhance re-usability of Cultural Heritage data models and assets
• Pipelines for the integration of existing collection data into a semantic research data environment
• Toolkits for the analysis and visualization of Knowledge Graphs and analysis methods of semantic data

ORDEA extends and improves existing ORD practices in the field of Cultural Heritage as well as Art History, and related disciplines. By using ontologies and SRDMs tailored to the specific needs of the disciplines, data will not only comply with the FAIR principles, but also achieve better quality and structure. The tools allow researchers to easily analyze, publish, and adapt data to common standards. This ensures greater visibility, accessibility, and exchange of their research output. By making Computer Vision data available by way of semantic data, researchers benefit from enriched data and gain new research perspectives from Computer Science.