Usability and Narrative Geolocation for the Monitoring of Spanish Artistic Heritage

Abstract

This digital conservation project allows us to trace Spanish artworks during the Spanish and post-war Civil War. It shows the reality of a crucial period for Spanish heritage, providing tools to analyse the saved works and their destiny, and demonstrating the work of all those who during the war fight on the front of art. A web application was developed that allows cataloguing, tracking, and studying the works that were saved and deposited in safe places by the republic. Interdisciplinary work was carried out considering usability parameters and incorporating a geolocation system. A more accurate version of the journey and the history of the artworks is shown, proposing a new geolocated narrative. The result is an interactive system capable of cataloguing, tracking and studying the works of art that the Republic drew from museums, palaces and residences to bring them to safety from the fascist attacks of the side that upraised against the government of the democratically instituted Republic in Spain. These works followed an authentic odyssey and most returned to the museums, not always to the same, but there are lost and/or missing works that can be traced thanks to this open, collaborative and geolocated website.