An Unbeliever’s Defense of the Heritage of Faith
As we start off this new year, Arc/k has some exciting things ahead and we hope you’ll join us in new and further explorations of our past, which will be the path to our future.
I am occasionally asked the question, usually by an unsuspecting co-passenger on a long flight from which there is no escape, why I, as a devout atheist, work so hard at saving the religious expressions of cultures past and present. The diatribe to which I subject the victim, most recently the guy in seat 11B, might well be titled “Awe and Splendour: The Numinous Experience of the Non-Believer… Pluralist Exercises in Reverent Atheism.” Poor fellow.
What I believe is that even our darkest, most perverse twistings of religion and philosophy, Nazism, Wahhabism and a whole ugly legion of distorted “-isms” are part of a legacy of historical evolution (complete with plenty of dead-ends) which must be preserved in the finest detail possible—the mistakes and grotesques so as not to be repeated, and the glorious and uplifting, so as to be emulated and better understood.
I believe in the adoption of pluralism. Pluralism of belief, pluralism of race and modes of living and loving and worshipping — or not. It doesn’t have to be comfortable or easy — like eating your spinach, it can be good for you without always going down easy and when was growth and learning and true change ever an effortless undertaking? If truly executed, it is the opposite of racism, the opposite of retrenchment, the opposite of fear.
Because I feel so strongly that the answer to where humanity is headed is right in front of us in the artifacts and culture left behind, I am making cultural preservation my life’s work: multi-culturalism — racial, linguistic, philosophical, religious diversity.
So we hope you find our work on Palmyra and the sacred Secwepemc Pithouse worthy and interesting in that regard and that you’ll join us in our efforts to grow and expand our work with our Kickstarter campaign coming up in February. (Details below.) And if you’ll be at the South By Southwest conference in March, please come to our workshop and do some photogrammetry with us. We love meeting and collaborating with our fellow “citizen scientists.” Working together we can help save endangered heritage.
Wishing you and yours a wonderful 2018 – thank you for your interest in cultural preservation and in our work here at Arc/k. The work will never end and neither will our dedication to it. Please stay with us as we fight the good fight.
All best,
Brian
Perpetuity | Palmyra
As some of you may know, we’ve embarked on a journey to digitally preserve and restore the historical sites in Palmyra, Syria. Since 2015, ISIS has damaged or destroyed many of the ruins of this two-thousand year old ancient center of multiculturalism. We at Arc/k knew that we had to step in and exercise our talents in photogrammetry to accurately recapture the city in a state-of-the-art VR experience.
As of now, Perpetuity | Palmyra consists of three sites (all pictured here). Our big project for 2018 will be implementing a second version of this project.
That means:
As some of you may know, we’ve embarked on a journey to digitally preserve and restore the historical sites in Palmyra, Syria. Since 2015, ISIS has damaged or destroyed many of the ruins of this two-thousand year old ancient center of multiculturalism. We at Arc/k knew that we had to step in and exercise our talents in photogrammetry to accurately recapture the city in a state-of-the-art VR experience.
As of now, Perpetuity | Palmyra consists of three sites (all pictured here). Our big project for 2018 will be implementing a second version of this project.
That means:
• Adding numerous other sites to our existing VR experience in order to capture the city in its entirety
• Refining our existing sites to a more exact level of detail
• And more!
We want to push our Palmyra experience to its most immersive and full-scale potential. In order to fulfill this vision, we are running a Kickstarter campaign!
Kickstarter Campaign Launch:
Tuesday, February 20th
We’ve been hard at work on our Palmyra project for over a year now and would love nothing more than to start off 2018 knowing we’ll be able to complete it. But we need your support to do so. Stay tuned…
Learn more about Perpetuity | Palmyra here
Spotlight:
The Secwepemc Project
At Arc/k we’ve been hard at work bringing to life an interactive VR experience of a Secwepemc Pithouse through digital captures! These structures are ephemeral, lasting only about 30 years and are a very important part of the Secwepemc band’s spiritual ceremonies. Now, we have the ability to preserve it beyond its lifespan for educational endeavours as well as historical documentation, both inside and outside of the First Nations Tribe. We worked closely alongside the tribe to get their full input and make sure we correctly captured the magic of these incredible buildings.
The final digital reconstruction of a Secwepemc Pithouse.
Spotlight:
The Secwepemc Project
At Arc/k we’ve been hard at work bringing to life an interactive VR experience of a Secwepemc Pithouse through digital captures! These structures are ephemeral, lasting only about 30 years and are a very important part of the Secwepemc band’s spiritual ceremonies. Now, we have the ability to preserve it beyond its lifespan for educational endeavours as well as historical documentation, both inside and outside of the First Nations Tribe. We worked closely alongside the tribe to get their full input and make sure we correctly captured the magic of these incredible buildings.
The final digital reconstruction of a Secwepemc Pithouse.
SXSW 2018
Arc/k has officially been chosen to host a super-cool workshop at SXSW this year teaching photogrammetry as part of their Social Impact / Interactive Program! We are thrilled to be able be a part of such a fantastic conference that brings thousands from all over the world. Come hang with us while learning photogrammetry!
March 11 from 3:30 – 5:30
ATALM
In October, ATALM, a non-profit devoted to developing and sustaining the cultural sovereignty of Native Nations, held their International Conference of Indigenous Archives, Libraries and Museums in Albuquerque. Members from various tribes, along with non-tribal cultural institutions who desired to preserve their cultures were in attendance to share ideas and stories.
Alongside representatives of the Secwepemc Tribe of Canada, who we collaborated with to capture several lifelike 3D models of their museum collection, we explained the importance of dissemination of culture in new mediums such as virtual reality and how it can be most effectively utilized. We publicly unveiled examples of our work with the tribe in VR. This conference taught us much about the concerns and challenges for North American tribes and how to best aid them in the preservation of what is most vital, their histories.