VAIA Study Day Cultureel erfgoed analyseren en ontsluiten met artificiële intelligentie (25/03)

During this first study day for specialists in cultural heritage, several experts explain how they apply artificial intelligence to analyse cultural heritage and make it accessible. What is possible today, and what does the future hold?

The opening keynote lecture will be given by Prof. Luc Steels: “Kan AI de betekenis van artistiek erfgoed helpen bewaren?”

AI in the analysis of paintings addressed by Aleksandra Pizurica: “Digital Image Processing and het Lam Gods”

Information processing in support of art investigation is an emerging and rapidly growing cross-disciplinary field of research. Museums are now routinely digitizing their collections in multiple imaging modalities. Next to standard digital photographs, infrared and X-ray images, new sensing technologies are being developed and employed together with advanced techniques for analysing multimodal data. The progress in AI and particularly in deep learning opens up unprecedented possibilities for supporting technical study of art works, their conservation, and even presentation. AI-driven techniques are increasingly employed not only to authenticate artworks, but also to uncover their hidden details and connections to other works, to enhance viewing experience and to improve understanding of various layers of a masterpiece. In this talk we present our results in applying AI techniques to support the analysis and restoration of master paintings. The focus is on the Ghent Altarpiece and on the experience gained from a multidisciplinary collaboration in the framework of the recent major conservation campaign conducted on the Hubert and Jan Van Eyck’s masterpiece.

Read more on the VAIA website.