A research chair to envision the museums of tomorrow

How can we improve the experience of museum visitors? How can we increase the emotional impact and knowledge of works of art through new technologies? These are the questions that will be tackled by the work of the future holder of the Fondation Gandur pour l’Art Chair, newly created at EPFL.

Digital Humanities is an expanding field of study at EPFL. At the crossroads between the Humanities and the so called "hard" sciences, the new research chair will be part of the school’s College of Humanities and will focus on the promotion, study and conservation of works of art by means of new technologies.

The possibilities are endless in view of the number of technologies that can be used to create new forms of museology. The research will also be applied in a dedicated space for experimental museology, which is currently under construction on the EPFL campus, also supported by the Fondation Gandur pour l’Art.

The involvement of the Foundation makes it possible to create this new research chair and goes well beyond a financial contribution. The Foundation will also make its art collections available to researchers and museum specialists. Its collections include exceptional archaeological pieces, European post-war paintings and a set of medieval and modern decorative arts pieces.

The research conducted by the new chair should be beneficial to the whole world of museology, as it looks at the complete value chain from the exhibition and promotion of works of art, to the analysis of the public’s reaction to proposed innovations. "The dialogue between humanities and technology is at the heart of our work in Digital Humanities”, said Patrick Aebischer, President of EPFL. “We think it will benefit the art world tremendously.”

The recruitment of the holder of the Fondation Gandur pour l’Art Chair, who is scheduled to start in 2017, will begin in the coming weeks. His or work at the intersection of the arts, the Humanities and advanced technology will contribute to making the Lake Léman region a center of the renewal of tomorrow’s museums. "We see a strong dynamic and high ambition for this type of initiative in the Lake Léman region. The different projects underway enable us to imagine some very promising synergies in the future", said Jean Claude Gandur.