The Red Dot takes its name from the small sticker that once marked slides in a physical archive, flagging them as worth a second look. We’re keeping that spirit alive here.
At MIRL, we engage with art history, digital humanities, and material culture through hands-on research and archival projects. Guided by our core principles—critical engagement with visual and material culture, ethical stewardship of images and data, and innovative approaches to research and pedagogy—we work at the intersection of technology and the humanities. We are especially interested in how digital tools can expand the study of images, objects, and spaces.
The Red Dot © 2025 is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0
-
Jackson Pollock and The Case of the Fly in the Paint
No, not a new young adult book, but real life tales from the world of conservation! Conservators at the Museum of Modern Art in NY have been conducting a 10-month examination and restoration of Jackson Pollock’s One: Number 31, 1950 and have made some interesting discoveries. It appears that not all of the paint was… Read more
-
Arcimboldo’s paintings as giant sculptures
Giuseppe Arcimboldo’s 16th century paintings of actual people, or of representations of seasons or elements, are entirely unique. He constructed compositions of fruits, vegetables, trees, and other “ingredients” that somehow look like people – see Summer (1563) at left. His creations have been sampled by many, many artists. The latest case of Arcimboldo inspiration is… Read more
-
Photography and privacy violations
There is something of a Rear Window quality to it all… New York photographer Arne Svenson has his neighbors outraged. His new show, at the Julie Saul Gallery in NYC, features photos of residents in the highrise across the street, but the photos were taken without their knowledge with a birdwatching telephoto lens. Some of… Read more
-
Construction company bulldozes Mayan temple
Various sources report that a construction company in Belize has razed most of the 2,300-year-old Nohmul temple. Only one small section of the Mayan temple core remains standing (picture at left). The company was apparently gathering crushed rock for a road project. via 7 News Belize, BBC News, and Huffington Post (with pictures) Read more
-
Happy Anniversary, World Wide Web!
Last summer we celebrated the first web image (and a fine one it was). Now we offer our congrats to the 20th anniversary of the World Wide Web — with a facsimile of the first page that was launched. Click here for more information about the site and its restoration. via LA Times Read more
-
New moods of van Gogh revealed?
In preparation for a new exhibition of paintings by van Gogh and his contemporaries, Vincent van Gogh at Work , new color analyses of hundreds of his paintings, drawings, and notebooks have revealed that he may have been more methodical and less “mad” than previously thought. In fact the director of the Van Gogh museum… Read more