Markus JOBST
(Vienna University of Technology, Austria)
Cultural heritage (CH) management generally has to make use of detailed geovisualizations and appropriate mapping methods. For example a nationwide or even European-wide management of mosaic sites makes use of overview maps, local area maps and detailed maps in order to plan technical or expert operations. Therefore maps form a central management tool especially when various experts have to interact and communicate across borders.
The main advantage of web-mapping technologies for CH management is spatial independency of the central application. Independent from the input location, a central system can be feeded with new material, virtual findings and expertise, whereas on the other side of the world colleagues start to work on this new material. At the same time latest technological developments in form of application programming interfaces (API) extensively provide detailed map material, which can easily be used for individual mapping and database purposes with very simple extensions.
This contribution describes several web-mapping technologies appropriate for CH management processes, compares existing global CH initiatives with their visualization problems and explains possible graphical solutions from a cartographic point of view. We will show that specific cartographic modelling can enhance CH management processes on one hand and support the public cultural communication process on the other.
Keywords: web-mapping, cultural heritage management, perception, documentation