Heritage Artefacts in the COVID-19 Era: The Aura and Authenticity of 3D Models

1 Introduction

The COVID-19 pandemic and the necessary physical and consequent social isolation made clear the increasing need for more (but also better) digital content. Recent reports have highlighted that providing digital content in different forms is considered one of the most effective means of keeping audiences engaged. UNESCO’s report on “Museums Around the World in the Face of COVID-19” (UNESCO, 2020), for example, emphasises that the pandemic allowed many institutions to utilise previous digitisation investments, including 360° tours, virtual museums, and digital exhibitions, while increasing their outreach on social media platforms (pp. 15–16). Many institutions, in most cases those with sufficient resources, also developed new atypical projects during the lockdown, including educational challenges and behind the scenes. The report on “Museums, Museum Professionals and COVID-19” by the International Council of Museums (ICOM – International Council of Museums, 2020) confirms that museums’ digital services increased after the lockdown, almost by 50% for social media and in the range between 10% and 19% for online collections and exhibitions, podcasts, quiz contests, newsletters, and live events (p. 10). Also, the report on the “Impact of the COVID-19 Situation on Museums in Europe” by the Network of European Museum Organisations (NEMO – Network of European Museums Organisation, 2020) calls for more investment in digital heritage, including both digital services and engaging digital experiences, recognising that they “bring[ing] people together, encourage[ing] creativity…and offer[ing] a virtual space to build ideas collectively” (p. 3).

It is not a coincidence that the European Commission also launched in June 2020 a public consultation on digital access to European Cultural heritage to revise the 2011 Recommendation (EUR-Lex – European Union Law, 2011) on the digitisation and online accessibility of cultural material and digital preservation. It is worth noting that the 2011 Recommendation did not include a reference to 3D digitisation (only to audio-visual content) contrary to the 2020 consultation survey that addressed questions on the role of 3D technologies in cultural heritage, including the value of “digital twins,” for example, in the case of Notre Dame, the creation of high-quality 3D models of museum objects before they get lost due to theft or damage, online visualisation of heritage monuments, and immersive experiences. It is clear that 10 years after the previous recommendation and in light of recent cases of heritage loss and inaccessibility, priorities have shifted to more technologically advanced and engaging digital solutions. Similar recent initiatives by the European Commission (EC – European Commission, 2020) such as the report on the “Basic Principles and Tips for 3D Digitisation” and the study on the quality in 3D Digitisation of tangible cultural heritage led by the Cyprus Institute of Technology, which was launched in September 2020 (CIT – Cyprus Institute of Technology, 2020), also aim to respond to the increasing need for the (3D) digitisation of tangible heritage.

Within this context, we ought to explore more closely the 3D digitisation of material culture. The remediation of physical artefacts into three dimensions brings new possibilities of interaction, including digital manipulation and engagement with multimodal contextualisation. However, it also brings challenges: 3D models miss essential qualities of the original objects, such as their physical substance and location (Jeffrey, 2015, p. 146). The objects’ physical context is also missing, for example, museum rooms and corridors, neighbouring artefacts and related collections, as well as interactions within and among visiting groups, are absent from most 3D digitisations; therefore, the personal, physical, and social contexts (Falk & Dierking, 2016; Grüner, Specker, & Leder, 2019, p. 2) that form museum experiences cannot be easily or meaningfully integrated – let alone replicated – into 3D models (also see Vayanou, Katifori, Chrysanthi, & Antoniou, 2020 on the social dimension of virtual heritage experiences in the times of COVID-19). As a result, the experience that one has with a 3D heritage artefact and consequently user actions and perceptions are mostly mediated through technology (Moens, 2018, p. 75). Therefore, we ought to problematise how our understanding and appreciation of heritage artefacts change through technological mediation. To explore the latter, two key concepts need to be discussed: aura and authenticity.

Drawing from Walter Benjamin’s seminal work (1968/2007) and from the authors who discussed and further elaborated on his ideas (Cameron, 2007; Di Giuseppantonio Di Franco, Galeazzi, & Vassallo, 2018; Douglas-Jones, Hughes, Jones, & Yarrow, 2016; Garstki, 2016; Holtorf, 2013; Jeffrey, 2015; Jeffrey, Hale, Jones, Jones, & Maxwell, 2015; Latour & Lowe, 2011), including a discussion of aura in the digital realm (Coleman, 2014; Jones, Jeffrey, Maxwell, Hale, & Jones, 2017; Kenderdine & Yip, 2018; MacIntyre, Bolter, & Gandy, 2004), we define aura as the experience one has with a heritage artefact that triggers a personal, emotional response, a feeling of awe and excitement of being in front of something that is part of a bigger past. Authenticity, on the other hand, is defined based on the qualities of an artefact that make it being perceived as an object of the past. This includes its biography and testimony of the passage of time and is also influenced by the authority of the institution exhibiting it as well as the social and cultural meaning assigned to it by different communities. In this article, we treat aura as an integral part of authenticity, arguing that authentic artefacts should be able to induce auratic experiences on viewers; however, auratic experiences alone cannot infuse authenticity into an artefact.

Building on several studies that have problematised these two concepts for heritage artefacts, this article embarks on establishing an exploratory framework aimed at evaluating the experience of aura and authenticity in 3D digitisations of cultural heritage. By using two 3D models as case studies, the Rosetta Stone (British Museum) and the Lewis Chess Pieces (National Museums Scotland), this article also applies and evaluates this framework via a mixed-method approach. This exploration allowed us to conclude that even though some aspects of aura and authenticity are intrinsically related to the physicality and materiality of the original, three-dimensional digital models can still manifest aura and authenticity, as long as a series of parameters including multimodal contextualisation, affective experiences, and multisensoriality are facilitated. Given the increasing rate of (3D) digitisation and the changes the pandemic has brought in how we experience and interact with cultural heritage, future digitisation initiatives ought to explore more deeply and consider in the shaping of online engagements how people respond to the three-dimensional representations of material culture. It is to be hoped that the proposed framework will provide the means to evaluate such online experiences and better inform future digitisation endeavours.

2 Background

3D digitisation initiatives include those run by heritage institutions (e.g. British Museum, Smithsonian, Fitzwilliam) and non-profit organisations (e.g. CyArk), those supported or endorsed by Governments (e.g. The Scottish Ten) and EU-funding (e.g. 3D-Icons), and smaller scale initiatives that also involve community groups (e.g. Digital Heritage Age; ACCORD). We recognise that in the uncertainty and consequent rush that the pandemic caused, it was almost impossible for museums to invest in this form of engagement and knowledge production if they were not previously actively engaged in it. Even though in the last 10 years (and more intensively in the last five), technological advancements have made possible the 3D digitisation of tangible heritage at a much higher rate, better quality, and lower cost (money, time, people) than it was previously possible, and it still requires expertise and resources that, in most cases, are not readily available in heritage institutions. It is for this reason that there was not any significant increase in the release of 3D models during the pandemic with the exception of 360° virtual tours that were mass produced, which, however, cannot capture the social experience of a museum visit. In addition, most of these virtual tours do not include (adequate) contextual information about the artefacts or works of art, and their quality is not sufficient to closely explore the exhibits and their details; the latter is also quite common in virtual tours pre-COVID-19. On the other hand, institutions with more resources managed to develop more sophisticated virtual tour applications that included annotations, close-ups, and audio narratives, such as the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam (VGM – Van Gogh Museum, 2020), the Louvre Museum in Paris (Louvre, 2020), and the Maritime Greenwich UNESCO World Heritage Site (ORNCG – Old Royal Naval College Greenwich, 2020).

In this article, we will not deal with all different types of 3D heritage representations, for example, 360° virtual tours and virtual worlds, but we will problematise the affordances of 3D models, that is, interactive digital objects that have been produced by digitising physical objects with the purpose of communicating cultural heritage to a broader audience. As we have showcased in another article (Papadopoulos, Hamilakis, Kyparissi-Apostolika, & Díaz-Guardamino, 2019), 3D models can also be used to enhance researchers’ perspectives on material culture; however, the current article is mostly concerned with their use by the public.

Instead of flat images that we are so accustomed to producing as professionals and consuming as observers/users of heritage content, 3D models offer three-dimensional representations of physical objects that can better evoke corporeal, multisensorial, kinaesthetic, and affective experiences (Papadopoulos et al., 2019, p. 627). Digital manipulation enables a sense of virtual tactility (Di Giuseppantonio Di Franco et al., 2018, pp. 4–5), allowing the observation of and interaction with the minute details of objects’ geometry, colour, and texture, thus evoking a contact with their physical counterparts. When 3D models are accompanied by annotations and multimodal contextualisation, they also provide deeper insights into objects’ biographies and their context. As a result, 3D models have the potential to enable museum visitors to do more than in physical museums (excluding of course the social aspect of a museum experience; see, for example, Falk & Dierking, 2016, pp. 47–49), where the interaction with artefacts is very often forbidden, and their context is often described with some minimal information (typically including the type of object, region, culture, and date) and some broader contextualisation for the display case or collection.

A survey conducted with 203 Sketchfab (the leading repository for 3D models) users concluded that providing a wider historical context is very important to better comprehend heritage objects (Lloyd, 2016, p. 864). Other authors also argue that a wider contextualisation is essential to offer a more complete comprehension of digitised heritage artefacts. Hindmarch, Terras, and Robson (2019) have stated, for example, that 3D models can inherit “some of the original’s aura” (p. 251) when they are adequately contextualised (also see Linaza, Juaristi, & Garcia, 2014; Statham, 2019). On the other hand, they maintain that when 3D models are presented isolated and stripped off of their original context, they lose their potential to prompt an affectual response.

However, 3D collections typically follow the exhibition patterns observed in physical museum collections: 3D models are presented with none or very limited contextual information, little or no metadata (or paradata), while not often making use of the affordances of the 3D environments, e.g. by adding (insightful) annotations. Three-dimensional collections of major museums, such as the British Museum, the Smithsonian, the Metropolitan, and the Victoria & Albert Museum, are only some representative examples of this. The aforementioned Sketchfab user survey, however, also revealed that annotations alone are not enough since users prefer deeper historical contextualisation. On the other hand, there are examples of initiatives and institutions that have made better use of 3D digitisations by providing contextualisation and embedding them into larger narrative frameworks. For example, The Invincible Wreck (Cloud Tour, 2020) combines audio-visual narrative, archival material, and rich annotations, interaction at different levels and with multiple 3D models, all of which provide a coherent narrative about the shipwreck’s biography. With less assets but still in an effective and engaging way, the British Science Museum Group (BSMG – British Science Museum Group, 2020) and the National Museums Scotland (NMS – National Museums Scotland, 2020) also embedded their 3D models in webpages with enriching multimodal information such as fact lists, figures, and graphics. The BSMG, in particular, also provides lesson plans for using their 3D models in an object-based learning approach before or after visiting the museum or to spark interest and generate discussion in the classroom. An interesting approach has also been followed in the case of the Near Life: The Gipsformerei – 200 Years of Casting Plaster by the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (SMZB – Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 2020), which digitised the exhibition hall as well as individual exhibits, which were also contextualised by an audio guide and curatorial text content.

Despite the new possibilities that 3D models bring, it remains open how they mediate their affectual power and trigger users’ emotional response; in other words, if and how the aura of the original artefact is transmitted or (re)generated in the digitised three-dimensional model. It is also questionable whether users perceive the 3D models as credible, truthful representations of heritage artefacts, i.e. if 3D models can emanate the authenticity of the original. In a materialist approach, aura and authenticity are seen as inherent characteristics of original, physical objects. The authors who take a materialist perspective (e.g. Douglas-Jones et al., 2016, p. 831; Holtorf, 2013, p. 441) argue that the sense of pastness is directly tied to objects’ physical characteristics. This notion is also present in Walter Benjamin’s seminal ideas on authenticity. The German critical theorist defined authenticity as “the essence of all that is transmissible from its beginning, ranging from its substantive duration to its testimony to the history which it has experienced” (1968/2007, p. 221). For Benjamin, “what is really jeopardized when the historical testimony is affected is the authority of the object, the weight it derives from tradition… What withers in the age of the technological reproducibility of the work of art is the…aura.” (1968/2007, p. 221). According to Rochlitz (1996, p. 152), aura is defined by “the uniqueness of a moment of temporal apparition and its unapproachability, its distancing despite a spatial proximity.”

On the other hand, constructivist approaches challenge the connection of aura and authenticity with objects’ materiality, arguing that they are socially created notions and, thus, can be negotiated among observers, objects, and places (Cameron, 2007; Coleman, 2014; Jeffrey, 2015, 2018; Jones et al., 2017; Latour & Lowe, 2011; MacCannell, 1976; MacIntyre et al., 2004; Walsh, 2007). For some of these scholars, reproductions are, in fact, essential for the aura of the original, since by means of copying and replication, the original retains its unique value (Latour & Lowe, 2011; MacCannell, 1976; Walsh, 2007). Latour and Lowe (2011, p. 9), for example, argue that the aura of the original can migrate to its representation. Building on the latter, Jeffrey (2015, p. 148) argues that this migration can also occur in digital reproductions. Foster and Jones state that “replicas can be as old and as authentic as we feel them to be” (2018, p. 20), essentially arguing that what matters is the perceived authenticity. They also argue that replicas take their meaning and value from their contexts; for example, in situ replicas, placed in heritage sites, replace and stand for something that is missing, whereas replicas in museum contexts develop an independent biography bound up with the story of a new place. For Cameron (2007, p. 67) as well, digital objects can accumulate their own authenticity and aura since they are creative works with their own history and provenance. Other scholars believe that aura – rather than being a matter of originals or copies – is related to the social (MacIntyre et al., 2004) or individual (Coleman, 2014) significance we attribute to any kind of objects.

Several authors have paved the way for the investigation of aura and authenticity in museum artefacts. Cameron and Gatewood (2000, 2003) and Latham (2013) explored transcendental experiences in relation to museum visits, while Hampp and Schwan (2014a, 2014b) focused their studies on authenticity, outlining aspects that differentiate an original from a replica. Although not focused on museum artefacts, De Jong (2018) also contributed to that examination when listing the levels of authentication that a museum exhibition should pass to emanate authenticity. A few studies also investigated the conditions under which 3D representations of heritage objects can evoke aura and authenticity (Jeffrey, 2015, 2018; Jones et al., 2017; Kenderdine & Yip, 2018).

3 The Ten Elements of Aura and Authenticity

The framework proposed in this article is based on previous studies that explored the aura and authenticity of heritage artefacts by deploying visitor/user evaluations and/or developing a theory-informed discussion of the two concepts. Among those who examined user experiences, Cameron and Gatewood (2000) argue that visitors seek transcendental experiences, which are characterized by three parameters. The first is deep engagement, in which visitors intensely gaze at a given artefact, losing the sense of the passing of time. The second is empathy, in which visitors imagine the experiences, feelings, and thoughts of the people who used these artefacts in the past. The third is awe or reverence akin: the feeling of being in the presence of something holy. Although the authors did not explicitly mention aura and authenticity, the three parameters are closely related to what is understood and discussed as the effect of aura and authenticity on museum visitors. Thus, their work represents the first steps in the formulation of a framework for evaluating auratic experiences in museums, as also argued by Kenderdine and Yip (2018, p. 14).

Cameron and Gatewood’s findings were further developed by Latham (2013). Taking a phenomenological approach, the author interviewed participants to delve deeper into their transcendental experiences with museum artefacts. She identified four themes that are essential for this phenomenon: unity of the moment, object link, being transported, and connections bigger than self (pp. 8–11). Unity of the Moment is described by Latham as the bubble established between the viewer and the object in which the other three essences occur. For Object Link, the artefact acts as a trigger to stimulate perceptions, thoughts, and feelings. In the feeling of Being Transported, visitors feel like they are alone and transported back to the artefact’s era, also experiencing alterations in their conception of space and time. Finally, Connections Bigger than Self refers to deep experiences one develops, often evoking memories and personal stories, as well as sensations of awe and wonder.

On the basis of Latham’s work, Hampp and Schwan (2014a, 2014b) conducted studies to examine authenticity in physical artefacts at the Deutsches Museum. By presenting to participants the original artefacts either as originals or as replicas, the authors found that objects perceived as replicas were able to induce similar effects as the original artefacts (2014b, p. 363). Based on the responses to a survey and interviews with the participants, they identified four factors that differentiate an original from a replica: (a) history, since authentic objects prompt a link with the past; (b) charisma, since authentic objects are grandiose and have an awe effect; (c) rarity, since heritage artefacts are usually unique (or at least scarce) and cannot be created in the same way as in the past; and (d) functionality, since authentic objects should function in the same way they functioned in the past. Hence, they concluded that the way objects are presented has a strong influence on visitors’ perception of authenticity. They also highlighted that museums’ reputation can also confer authenticity even to replicas (pp. 363–364).

Steffi de Jong has problematised authenticity in museum exhibitions. She argued that to emanate authenticity, an artefact must pass through four levels of authentication (2018, p. 119–122). The first one is object authentication, which is assured by the museum’s authority: if an object is owned and exhibited by a museum, people tend to assume that it is authentic. The second is narrative authentication, which refers to exhibition techniques, such as the way the object is displayed, the room in which it is exhibited, the juxtaposition with other objects, and the use of labels, text, and audio guides that present the object’s history. The third is exhibition authentication and is related to the design of the exhibition, i.e. how it has been organised and how it prompts the connection between the viewer and the object. The last one is the visitor experience authentication according to which viewers are immersed in the museum experience in such a way that they become witnesses of history themselves, thus ensuring the object’s authenticity.

A few studies have also investigated aura and authenticity in 3D representations. Kenderdine and Yip (2018), for example, concluded that the migration of the aura from the physical to the digital highly depends on the level of engagement offered by the exhibition: “the proliferation of aura in digital objects is contingent on the presence of transportive and immersive exchanges between viewer and object that connect the viewer to the histories and traditions of the object’s cultural trajectory” (p. 23). Jones et al. (2017) have also conducted research focused on the 3D digitisation of heritage sites by analysing a community-based and participatory creation project. The authors note that the process of recording and modelling heritage sites creates a bond among objects, sites, and the people involved, in such a way that places’ history becomes tied not only to the 3D models but also to those involved in their design and creation. As such, “the practices involved in the use of 3D technologies create networks of relationships between historic objects, people and places that become part of the biography of the virtual object and mediate the experience of authenticity for all involved” (2017, p. 349). The authors also highlighted evidence of aura migration once social and communal values, including the historical significance of the sites and their symbolic relations to identity, were triggered by collaboratively created 3D representations.

Jeffrey (2015) also argues that digital objects can emanate aura. Building on Latour and Lowe’s (2011) arguments according to which the aura of originals can migrate to their reproductions, Jeffrey argues that this migration can also occur in the digital realm under certain conditions (p. 148): democratisation, co-production, and the beauty of digital visualisations. However, he also highlights the “weirdness” of the digital world (p. 145), discussing five features of digital objects (pp. 145–146) that can potentially affect their aura and authenticity: lack of physical location, no substance, no degradation, infinite reproducibility, and lack of ownership. In effect, these characteristics strongly differentiate digital objects from the physical ones and contribute to the feeling that they are too distant from the material world and alienated from its sociocultural and historical components.

Finally, other authors argue that aura is defined by the significance we attribute to any kind of objects; in other words, it does not matter if it is an artefact exhibited in a museum, an original or a copy, and a physical or a digital object. MacIntyre et al. (2004), for example, defined the aura of an object or place as “the combination of its cultural and personal significance for a user or group of users” (p. 37). Similarly, Coleman (2014, para. 10) states that one attributes aura to any object that they have an emotional resonance with.

On the basis of the aforementioned studies, we identified 10 elements that are key for the experience of aura and authenticity in museum artefacts (Table 1). These 10 elements allowed us to translate the experience of aura and authenticity into simpler concepts and, thus, to examine among non-experts what triggered and/or hindered their experience of these while interacting with 3D models. Although the framework could have included more elements, some of them were grouped or omitted so as to be able to better utilise them in our mixed-method approach and make the adaptation of the framework for future studies easier. For example, “engagement” is explicitly mentioned by Kenderdine and Yip (2018) as essential to evoke aura. Latham (2013), on the other hand, does not use the term but discusses the relationship between the artefact and the observer. Since both studies describe similar effects on the observers, their ideas were grouped together under the element “engagement.” Similarly, Jeffrey’s “chain of proximity” (2015, p. 147) was not included as an individual element of the framework since it is not only an overarching analytical concept but also aligns with the element “creation process.” Table 1 presents these 10 elements along with their meaning and the studies from which we have drawn these concepts.

4 Methodology

To assess the effectiveness of our exploratory framework, we devised a mixed-method approach that combined an online survey and qualitative interviews to capture participants’ interaction and overall experiences with two 3D models selected for this study. The survey also provided a rich pool of potential interviewees, who were willing to further engage with the project and provide a more in-depth account of their experiences (Hesse-Biber, 2010, p. 465). As this research was carried out during the first wave of the pandemic, both the survey and interviews were conducted online. The researchers ensured participants’ privacy, anonymity, and confidentiality by asking for their consent and anonymising their responses.

Participants were asked about their interaction and experiences with 3D models of the Rosetta Stone (British Museum) and the Lewis Chess Pieces (National Museums Scotland), both available on Sketchfab. The Rosetta Stone (RS), found in 1799 during Napoleon Bonnaparte’s Egyptial Campaign, was the key to decipher the Egyptian hieroglyphics, since its three scripts inscribed in three languages, i.e. Egyptian hieroglyphics, Egyptian Demotic, and Ancient Greek, have the same meaning. The Lewis Chess Pieces (LCP) are a set of 11 gaming pieces dated in the late twelfth–early thirteenth century, discovered in 1831 in the Scottish island of Lewis, Scotland, as part of a buried hoard that contained a total of 93 gaming pieces. Our main motivation for selecting the 3D models of these two objects was that they represent well the contrast between non-contextualised and deeply contextualized 3D models. More specifically, the RS is presented on Sketchfab (British Museum, 2017), in the profile of the British Museum’s channel (British Museum, 2014), without any annotations and only with a short description (Figure 1). On the other hand, although the LCP was also uploaded on Sketchfab (NMS – National Museums Scotland, 2019), they have been embedded in the official website of the National Museums Scotland (NMS – National Museums Scotland, n.d.), accompanied by multimodal content, including text, videos, images, and a facts list, which describe the artefacts’ historical background and context (Figure 2). Also, both digitisations are of high quality and belong to credible and prestigious institutions, while both objects are quite known to the general public; RS is one of the most well-known archaeological objects worldwide, while the LCP are recognisable not only because of the popularity of the board game but also because they were used in a scene in the Harry Potter film “The Sorcerer’s Stone.”

Figure 1

Screenshot of the Sketchfab webpage in which respondents explored the 3D model of the Rosetta Stone. https://sketchfab.com/3d-models/the-rosetta-stone-1e03509704a3490e99a173e53b93e282.

Figure 2

Screenshots of the National Museums Scotland’s webpage in which respondents explored the 3D models of Lewis Chess Pieces. https://www.nms.ac.uk/explore-our-collections/stories/scottish-history-and-archaeology/lewis-chess-pieces/.

Once the artefacts were chosen, conducting an online survey was deemed to be the essential first step that could provide a substantial amount of quantitative data, also combined with some qualitative responses via open-ended questions. Given that respondents had to follow links to the 3D models and museums’ websites, as well as due to the pandemic that did not allow face-to-face interaction with research participants, a digital approach was a sufficient and responsible way to conduct this research. Respondents were reached via social media, including WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook groups. The design of the survey paid particular attention to the phrasing and ordering of questions to avoid bias, providing clear instructions, and developing questions that were only relevant for this research (Evans & Mathur, 2018, p. 872; Ward, 2017, para. 22, 31). Also, to avoid drop-off respondents, the survey was kept “long enough to get the required information, but not so long as to affect response rates” (Evans & Mathur, 2018, p. 873). The fact that all 71 respondents answered all survey questions, indicates that the latter was achieved.

The questionnaire, created in Google Forms, was divided into four sections, and included both open- and close-ended questions, as well as Likert scale questions. It was designed to find whether and how the 10 elements of aura and authenticity were experienced in the 3D models. Since the comparison of participants’ experiences with the two artefacts was essential for this research, questions for both 3D models were included in the same questionnaire. The first section covered the demographics of the respondents, including age, occupation, gender, and nationality. In the second section, respondents were asked about (a) their previous interaction/experience with 3D models and (b) their experience with/knowledge of each of the objects (Figure 3). The questions in the third and fourth sections were related to participants’ experience of aura and authenticity in their interaction with the 3D models (Figures 4 and 5). As aura and authenticity are difficult to comprehend concepts, the two terms were not explicitly mentioned in the questions, but instead they were described using the 10 elements of the framework presented in the previous section (Table 1).

Figure 3

Column chart showing participants’ personal response/relation to the artefacts.

Figure 4

Column chart showing participants’ experience with the two 3D models.

Figure 5

Column chart showing participants’ responses to the question “How much time did you spend in each website.”

Finally, the survey was deployed not only to gather primary data but also to identify respondents who were more likely to provide in-depth explanations about their experiences. Hence, semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with selected survey respondents. Questions in the interviews were devised to delve deeper into users’ perceptions, experiences, and interactions with the two models, and to better understand how specific aspects of their experiences affected their thoughts and feelings (Hesse-Biber, 2010, p. 455; Jensen & Laurie, 2016, p. 173; Weiss, 1994, p. 48). To enable the latter, probe questions in relation to certain answers they provided in the survey were asked. The collected data were thematically analysed, thus permitting the identification of four similar themes among different, individual experiences: contextualisation, interactivity physicality, and digitality.

5 Results and Discussion

5.1 Survey

The survey remained open for 10 days and collected 71 responses from 49 women, 21 men, and 1 who did not choose a gender identity. Most of them (62) were aged between 25 and 34 years, while almost half (32) were Brazilian. The latter was because of the network of one of the authors. It should be highlighted that although there were also teenagers and participants older than 65 years who responded to the survey, the participants in the 25–34 age group were the majority, thus not allowing us to reach safe conclusions about how other age groups may respond to 3D models. However, the geographic distribution of the respondents (20 nationalities) as well as their varying levels of education (from high school to doctorate) provided a diverse enough sample. The latter was amplified by the fact that of the 71 participants, only 10 respondents were aware of the Lewis Chess Pieces (LCP), while 38 had already heard about the Rosetta Stone (RS) (Figure 3). Also, two-thirds of our respondents (48) were not used to exploring 3D models.

According to the responses (Figures 3 and 4), 60 of the participants indicated that both 3D models were considered completely or quite trustworthy. The majority could perceive the rarity and uniqueness of the objects (LCP: 38, RS: 54) and feel a link to the past (LCP: 62, RS: 42). Also, most participants responded that they were impressed by the 3D models (LCP: 35, RS: 36). However, not all respondents felt connected to the artefacts: 37 for the RS and 21 for the LCP responded that they did not feel connected or only somewhat connected to them.

Respondents showed a predilection for the LCP. Although only 20 spent more than 2 minutes exploring the RS, 31 spent 2 or more minutes with the LCP (Figure 5). Also, while only 34 responded that they were satisfied/extremely satisfied with the information provided for the RS, 56 argued the same for the LCP. Nevertheless, the majority of participants were interested in seeing the original artefacts: 40 for the RS and 39 for the LCP (Figure 3).

The most significant difference in the responses was about the aspects that contribute to making the objects trustworthy (Figure 6). While 55 participants strongly agreed that the information provided about the LCP makes them a trustworthy representation, only 29 said the same for the RS.

Figure 6

Column chart showing a comparison between the elements that make the Rosetta Stone and the Lewis Chess Pieces trustworthy.

Besides, the responses collected via the open-ended questions indicated that an engaging experience with the artefacts, via information and interaction, could facilitate the auratic experience and make the objects trustworthy. Once respondents knew more about the artefacts’ history and could digitally interact with them, they found it easier to relate to them. This feeling is well illustrated by the following response:

“Rosetta Stone: to me it is only a single object that is taken out of all the context and the brief text has done a poor job presenting the context for the object. I don’t find anything relatable there. Lewis Chess Pieces: More background information is provided and I can get to know the history better. There are not only text(s) for explanation, but also photos which provide a visual presentation of the past.”

Responses also revealed that participants lacked the physicality of the experience. In addition, a few responses also indicated that the digital experience makes it harder to feel a link with the past:

“I knew I was exploring antiques, but the fact that I was looking at them through a computer screen avoided it from being an experience that made me think about the past.”

Participants’ responses to the survey provided an initial indication that the lack of physicality and the digitality of the experience were barriers to the experience of aura and authenticity. This was clarified further through the qualitative interviews.

Finally, it is worth noting that no substantial generational difference was found in participant responses. In all age groups, as indicated in both the survey and the interviews, there were amazed and bored respondents; those who could feel connected to the artefacts and those who could not; as well, those who liked very much to interact with the digitised objects and those who thought that the online experience is not as exciting as a physical visit to a museum.

6 Conclusion

This article has presented a framework that allows the investigation of whether aura and authenticity can be experienced on 3D representations of heritage artefacts, while utilising a user study to demonstrate how the 10 elements of aura and authenticity can be evaluated. Our findings demonstrate that despite the lack of physicality, which was highly missed by the participants in this study, interactivity, multimodality, and contextualisation enable users to experience aura and authenticity and develop affective experiences. Annotations seem to be a powerful method that has the potential to provide users of digital collections with enriching information. In addition, presenting 3D models in museums’ official websites – instead of only in 3D repositories – make the 3D representations appear not only more reliable but also more effective, since they are also embedded in a digital environment in which they can be better contextualised.

For this study, we collated and compared diverse ideas to suggest a framework that breaks down aura and authenticity into 10 elements. It should be noted, however, that despite the mixed-methods approach, the substantial survey sample, and the rich descriptions obtained through the interviews, we see the results of this research as a demonstration of the efficacy of the proposed framework rather than as an approach that should be adopted as is. We acknowledge that the 10 selected elements may not entirely encompass what aura and authenticity are, especially given the diverse discourse around these two concepts in different fields. This framework has been mostly based on literature around heritage and therefore has not considered research in other fields, for example game studies, in which far more complex issues would have to be considered, including edutainment, the affordances of virtual worlds, historical accuracy, artistic license, and photorealism, among many others (see, e.g. Chapman, 2016; Elliott, 2017; Mochocki, 2021; Politopoulos, Mol, Boom, & Ariese, 2019; Reinhard, 2018). Most importantly we acknowledge a potential criticism of our attempt to assess what appears to be not assessable due to the abstract and elusive nature of the two concepts. Despite these limitations, the present study has shown that the proposed framework can be effective in enabling the examination of the presence or the absence of various elements that have been proposed as integral in experiencing aura and authenticity, while also having the potential to be expanded or adapted for different research fields and applications.

Although this framework was devised for digitised artefacts, we advocate that it could be equally applied to other kinds of reproductions, including computer graphic reconstructions. We also believe that it could be applied – and, if needed, adapted for – other cases, including not only fine art but also physical artefacts, being replicas or originals. Similar studies could also explore the migration of the aura from the 3D representation to the original. Although the survey participants’ response that they would be interested in seeing the original artefact after experiencing the 3D model (Figure 3) may indicate such a migration, this was out of the scope of this research and thus was not explored further. Finally, follow-on studies on aura and authenticity in 3D representations should also consider 3D printouts of heritage artefacts as they have become increasingly common in heritage contexts (also see Cronin, 2015; Younan & Treadaway, 2015).

The COVID-19 pandemic found many institutions unprepared to make the digital transition. Museums that had already invested in the digitisation of their collections or the development of other digital engagements with their audiences managed to respond to the urgent need for cultural interactions, while others faced the consequences of the long-term devaluation of cultural heritage and of the challenges and inequalities that digitalisation has brought about. Although we did not experience a 3D digitisation rush, mostly because of the investment required in terms of time, skills, and money, it is without a doubt that the pandemic has changed our expectations and the ways we (will) interact with cultural heritage institutions and their collections. Pre-pandemic, we often experienced the mass 3D digitisation of heritage artefacts as a means of preservation. Even though the lessons learnt from the struggles of archiving and sustaining other types of digital scholarship have made clear that these two notions cannot be seen hand in hand, the “wow factor” of the 3D models together with the simplicity of digitisation tools (including the recent integration of LiDAR technology in Apple devices) and the accessibility of online repositories (e.g. Sketchfab) has cultivated a technological fetishism that drives the production of 3D models without considering their potential uses, users, and afterlives.

The rethinking of digital interactions in museum and heritage contexts during the pandemic and the revaluation of our responsibilities, priorities, and values in a post-pandemic world should take into account research that explores how people respond to the digital – either 3D or not – and how digitisations can be infused with meaning and value that go beyond the enchantment of the technology. We hope that the proposed framework that indicates what people value in three-dimensional representations of physical artefacts will provide a steppingstone that will enable museum professionals, digitisation experts, as well as 3D enthusiasts to rethink why three-dimensional representations are produced and how they can become meaningful for the intended audiences.

Finally, we would like to conclude this article with an invitation to other scholars to discuss what really constitutes aura and authenticity in heritage contexts. Discourses in cultural heritage typically use aura as an aesthetic category mostly based on Benjamin’s article “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” However, as many scholars argue (see, e.g. Costello, 2005; Hansen, 2008), the concept of aura needs to be explored by considering his earlier work as well as the different translations of his original work (Hansen, 2008, pp. 336–337), which highlight that aura is a historical category “something which art has or acquires only at a particular historical moment” (van den Akker, 2016). According to Benjamin’s unpublished report in 1930 (as quoted in Hansen, 2008, p. 336), “Everything I said on the subject [the nature of aura] was directed polemically against the theosophists, whose inexperience and ignorance I find highly repugnant… First, genuine aura appears in all things, not just in certain kinds of things, as people imagine.” For Benjamin, the emphasis is placed on the fact that experience, memory, and perception wane (Costello, 2005, p. 165), which is incompatible with a purely aesthetic view of aura. Similarly, authenticity is also a historical category attributed to an artwork during particular historical moments and circumstances, “its inception, appreciation, the possible damages it suffered, its testimony and so on” (van den Akker, 2016, p. 46). Therefore, artworks obtain aura (and authenticity) when they become “a thing of the past” (p. 50) and have collected history through their existence. A “historicising gaze” as van den Akker (2016) puts it, is necessary to fully comprehend Benjamin’s aura and authenticity; this is something that most of the work in our field is lacking and would be a welcomed addition to the existing discourses in 3D heritage.