"InterMedit: Mediterranean Exchange in Antiquity, a Bridge Between Cultures" was presented at the Puig des Molins Monographic Museum in Ibiza on April 27th and allows visitors to explore virtually and immersively a collection of fifty pieces. The technical execution of this virtual exhibition was carried out by the CORE network in Cultural Heritage and the OpenLabs. At UAB, fifty pieces were digitized in 3D, some of which were obtained for the first time with an exceptionally high level of detail, such as the Esculapius from Empúries. The presentation event was attended by: Benjamí Costa, Maria Bofill, and Helena Jiménez (MAEF); Jusèp Boya and Marta Santos (Museum of Archaeology of Catalonia); Lionel Izac and Sophie Izac (Centre des Monuments Nationaux, Salses Fortress, Enserune), and Oriol Vicente and Igor Bogdanovic (UAB).
This exhibition is part of the "InterMedit: Mediterranean Exchange in Antiquity, a Bridge Between Cultures" project, promoted by the Pyrenees-Mediterranean Euroregion and with three partner organizations: the Friends of the Archaeological Museum of Ibiza and Formentera Association (MAEF) (Balearic Islands), the Cultural Association of Friends of the Empúries Museum-Unitikesken (Catalonia), and the Oppidum Museum and Enserune Museum (Occitania), through the French Centre des Monuments Nationaux.
The virtual exhibition was made possible thanks to the teamwork that involved the participation of the technicians from the aforementioned museums and the collaboration of the CORE network in Cultural Heritage and the UABOpenlabs of the Autonomous University of Barcelona.
"InterMedit: Mediterranean Exchange in Antiquity, a Bridge Between Cultures" highlights the significance of the ancient connection between the three regions involved in the project through archaeological remains from three great civilizations of Antiquity (Phoenician, Etruscan, and Greek) that were present in the Western Mediterranean. Initially, the idea was to create a physical exhibition, but shifting it to the virtual world allows this rich cultural heritage to be made accessible to anyone, from anywhere in the world.
This virtual exhibition can be accessed via a website developed by UAB in collaboration with the Swiss company VR-ALL-Art, offering an immersive experience through virtual reality goggles. Visitors can enjoy a 3D view of fifty pieces and sculptures digitized by UAB in very high resolution and with maximum detail. Among the most notable pieces are the goddess Tanit from the Puig des Molins necropolis in Ibiza, and the god Esculapius from Empúries, an icon of Catalan archaeology.
“With this project, we have shown that it is possible to create exhibitions that would be nearly impossible in the physical world due to the challenges of bringing together such important pieces in one space, which are the finest examples of Eastern sculptures in pre-Roman Mediterranean archaeology. Digitization is transforming the way we think about the dissemination of archaeological heritage and museology, and, importantly, it also contributes to the democratization of culture,” says Oriol Vicente, archaeologist and head of the CORE network in Cultural Heritage at UAB. “Moreover, the 3D models we’ve obtained, many of which are unprecedented, are also useful for research and conservation of the pieces.”
The project also involved students from the Master's in Humanities and Digital Heritage UAB-UPF and resulted in a master's thesis on virtual environment design, carried out by student Yuwei Fang.
