Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Sep 8

Applications for fellowships in art history at many institutions are open this fall. Read a short blog post at HistPhil that I wrote with @nancyum.bsky.social on "Taking the Long View: Gauging the Impact of Residential Fellowships in Art History over the Decades." histphil.org/2025/09/08/t...

Taking the Long View: Gauging the Impact of Residential Fellowships in Art History over the Decades

Editors’ Note: Nancy Um and Matthew Westerby introduce findings from the Scholars Data Project, hosted by the Association of Research Institutes in Art History, on residential fellowships spo…

histphil.org

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

Whitney Trettien @whitneytrettien.bsky.social · Aug 7

I'm always looking for new videos to introduce digital humanities at the beginning of the semester. Most are usually too specialist or lecture-y. But this video essay by @tesstess.bsky.social, "Digital Humanities, or: The Broken Record of Everything," nails it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3Nn...

Digital Humanities, or: The Broken Record of Everything

YouTube video by DH Cologne

www.youtube.com

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Jul 29

You did all three nevers!

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Jul 29

I went over just to peek at the comments. Yikes.

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Jul 25

In the meantime, this is a *must read* www.jstor.org/stable/773364

American "Art History" and Contemporary Creation on JSTOR

Louis Filler, American "Art History" and Contemporary Creation, College Art Journal, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Autumn, 1952), pp. 42-52

www.jstor.org

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Jul 25

Would love to chat more on and offline too!

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Jul 25

Kay Wells touched on something similar in a 2021 paper (which I didn't get to attend) titled “Inventing Digital Humanities through the Index of American Design”. And Distant Viewing Lab created an experimental site to search Index of 🇺🇸 Design watercolors. distant-viewing.github.io/iad-demo/

DV Lab + Index of American Design

distant-viewing.github.io

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Jul 9

Two years later, I’ll just drop this here: “Reflections on the Suger Chalice: New Observations and Technical Analysis” by Dylan Smith and Therese Martin www.nga.gov/research/pub...

Reflections on the Suger Chalice | National Gallery of Art

www.nga.gov

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · Jun 22

"Literary style is not a puzzle you solve to get a little information treat" is my new motto.

Tobias Wilson-Bates @phdhurtbrain.bsky.social · Jun 21

This article is going to turn me into the Joker. Literary style is not a puzzle you solve to get a little information treat 😩😩😩

But A.I. can also simplify: if you’re struggling with the opening of “Bleak House,” you can ask for it to be rewritten using easier, more modern English. “Gas looming through the fog in divers places in the streets, much as the sun may, from the spongey fields, be seen to loom by husbandman and ploughboy,” Dickens wrote. Claude takes a more direct path: “Gas lamps glow dimly through the fog at various spots throughout the streets, much like how the sun might appear to farmers working in misty fields.”

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

Nancy Um @nancyum.bsky.social · May 23

With Amelia Goerlitz and @qwesterby.bsky.social I’ll be presenting on this topic on June 30. Register for the event here: getty.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: Introducing ARIAH Online: Website, Newsletter, and Scholars Data Project in Focus. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining th...

The Association of Research Institutes in Art History (ARIAH) is a consortium of twenty-seven research institutes dedicated to the study of arts and material culture. The consortium works to strengthe...

getty.zoom.us

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

Rainer Simon @aboutgeo.bsky.social · Apr 7

I'll be speaking on IIIF Community Call *this Wednesday*. Drop by if you want to hear about (and play with!) liiive.now!

IIIF Consortium @iiif.bsky.social · Apr 1

Join us April 9 at 9am PT / 17:00 UTC for our next #IIIF Community Call.

@aboutgeo.bsky.social will demo liiive.now, a real-time collaborative viewing and & annotation platform.

Zoom link on the Community Calendar: iiif.io/community

IIIF Community Call: liiive, Wednesday, April 9. 9am PT / 12pm ET / 17:00 UTC

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Apr 4

This is awful. I’m sorry, Carrie, and for all Sferisti.

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Feb 28

Your input needed! ℹ️ 🎨🚨
The National Gallery of Art wants to hear from you about visual arts research. Please take the survey – it's 10 minutes or less! www.surveymonkey.com/r/nga-schola...

#arthistory #architecturalhistory #digitalarthistory #artmuseums #GLAMS #GLAMresearch

Visual Arts Research Survey

Take this survey powered by surveymonkey.com. Create your own surveys for free.

www.surveymonkey.com

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

Shannon Mattern @shannonmattern.bsky.social · Jan 12

"Why not build [public interest tech] from the communities that exist around our public institutions, such as schools, colleges, community centres?... Platforms designed for communities are much more likely to hold to social values than platforms built for profit" (See also... [1/2])

🙋🏾‍♂️🤳 Exploring new concepts for a people-powered internet

An excerpt of Nick Couldry’s new book, The Space of the World

newpublic.substack.com

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Jan 12

Maybe I'll see you at Costco tomorrow while panic buying imported goods?

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Jan 7

Someone wants to rename the Gulf of Mexico to 'Mare Nostrum' apparently?

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Dec 5

Sierra On-Line Christmas Card from 1986 ❤️ 🦌

Internet Archive @archive.org · Dec 5

Attention software enthusiasts! Check out hidden gems handpicked by Internet Archive staff: blog.archive.org/2024/12/02/s...

Also, consider supporting Universal Access to All Knowledge: archive.org/donate/?orig...

DOS screenshot of a deer in a moonlit snowy landscape from Sierra On-Line’s 1986 "A Computer Christmas" holiday ecard.

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Dec 5

MFW you learn the S side of the circle of DiSC, for "Steadiness," originally stood for "Submission." 🤔🤔🤔

Oh, and the inventor of DiSC, William Marston, also created Wonder Woman!

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

Open Library of Humanities @openlibhums.org · Nov 25

“Annotating Upstream: Digital Scholars, Art History, and the Interoperable Image” by Matthew J. Westerby: doi.org/10.16995/olh... Published as part of the #OLHjournal Cultural Heritage Data for Research: Opening Museum Collections, Project Data and Digital Images for Research, Query and Discovery SC

Annotating Upstream: Digital Scholars, Art History, and the Interoperable Image

Written primarily from the position of an art historian engaged in digital research and data-intensive projects, this essay explores annotations on interoperable images and the possibility for annotat...

doi.org

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Nov 25

✍️ just in time for Thanksgiving travel – a new thing to read! "Annotating Upstream: Digital Scholars, Art History, and the Interoperable Image." I'm grateful to our editor Angela Dressen for this special edition and the team at OLH @openlibhums.bsky.social

olh.openlibhums.org/article/id/1...

Annotating Upstream: Digital Scholars, Art History, and the Interoperable Image

Written primarily from the position of an art historian engaged in digital research and data-intensive projects, this essay explores annotations on interoperable images and the possibility for annotat...

olh.openlibhums.org

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Oct 23

🚨 ICMA folks and area scholars! 🚨 Join for an ICMA pop up in Washington DC with a curator-led tour of the exhibition 'An Epic of Kings: The Great Mongol Shahnama' on Friday December 6 at the National Museum of Asian Art. Register here!

www.medievalart.org/icma-news/ic...

ICMA in DC: Exhibition tour of "An Epic of Kings: The Great Mongol Shahnama" - Friday 6 December 2024. Register today! — International Center of Medieval Art

ICMA in Washington DC Exhibition tour of  An Epic of Kings: The Great Mongol Shahnama Friday 6 December 2024, in person 1:30–3pm ET National Museum of Asian Art, Washington, DC Regist...

www.medievalart.org

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

Ana Marie Cox @anamariecox.bsky.social · Oct 15

"The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog."
- Glamorizes hustle culture
- Speciest
- Was taught to you in elementary school

"Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow."
- Metal as fuck
- Implies that you are a wizard
- No one will know you are testing out a font

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · Oct 3

I say this with love and as a professor of art history: the report on this study is junk. It’s not measuring a response to “real art” vs “reprints”; it’s measuring “seeing art in a museum” vs “seeing it on googles while in an MRI machine.” www.theguardian.com/science/2024...

Real art in museums stimulates brain much more than reprints, study finds

Scientists in Netherlands using eye-tracking and MRI scans found ‘enormous difference’ between genuine works and posters

www.theguardian.com

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Matt Westerby @qwesterby.bsky.social · Sep 30

Hey, Bluesky now has over 10 million users, and I was #75,227! Woot!

A virtual certificate with text "Celebrating 10M users on Bluesky, #75,227, Matt Westerby ‪@qwesterby.bsky.social‬, joined on May 13, 2023"

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Reposted by Matt Westerby

H-Net Job Guide @h-net-job-guide.bsky.social · Sep 20

New job:

Beinecke Postdoctoral Fellow

Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art, DC

https://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=67748

www.h-net.org

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