TOWARDS A VIRTUAL ART/ARCHAEOLOGY

Abstract

The term Virtual Archaeology was coined 30 years ago when personal computing and the first wave of digital devices and associated technologies became generally available to field archaeologists (Reilly 1991; 1992). The circumstances that led to the origin of Virtual Archaeology have been recounted elsewhere. Put briefly, Virtual Archaeology was intended for reflexive archaeological practitioners “to be a generative concept and a provocation allowing for creative and playful improvisation around the potential adoption or adaptation of any new digital technology in fieldwork; in other words to explore how new digital tools could enable, and shape, new methodological insights and interpretation, that is new practices” (Beale, Reilly 2017). Digital creativity in archaeology and cultural heritage continues to flourish, and we can still stand by these aspirations. However, in 2021, the definition and extent of this implied “archaeological” community of practice and its assumed authority seems too parochial. Moreover, the archaeological landscape is not under the sole purview of archaeologists or cultural heritage managers. Consequently, experimentation with novel modes and methods of engagement, the creation of new forms of analysis, and different ways of knowing this landscape, are also not their sole prerogative. This applies equally to Virtual Archaeology and digital creativity in the realm of cultural heritage more generally. We assert that other affirmative digitally creative conceptions of, and engagements with, artefacts, virtual archaeological landscapes and cultural heritage assemblages – in their broadest sense – are possible if we are willing to adopt other perspectives and diffract them through contrasting disciplinary points of view and approaches. In this paper we are specifically concerned with interlacing artistic and virtual archaeology practices within the realm of imaging, part of something we call Virtual Art/Archaeology.