A Data Atlas Method for Analysing and Visualising Dispersed Cultural Heritage Collections

The history of collecting is important because it can help us to understand how individuals, communities, societies and institutions like museums have sought to understand, capture, create and even contest their worlds. Yet researchers attempting to trace the movement of objects and collections between and within cultural heritage institutions are faced with complex data environments. Challenges relate to the intricacies of scope, size, availability, coverage, legacy attributes, level of digitisation and manifestation of collections, that often persist both within and between institutions. This complexity can impede data-driven collections research and likewise hinder infrastructural projects that seek to aggregate and digitally reconnect dispersed heritage collections. This paper accordingly proposes a methodological framework, the Collection Data Atlas, for mapping the informational landscape of complex cultural heritage collections that span institutions, information systems, epochs and materialities. Drawing on the research of the AHRC-funded ‘Sloane Lab: looking back to build future shared collections’ project, this paper presents an application of this framework, the Sloane Data Atlas as a synthesis and visualisation of the complex bibliographic and data environment of the collection of Sir Hans Sloane, the founding collection of the UK heritage sector.