Named after the small red sticker that once guided scholars through legacy 35mm slides, The Red Dot is here to help you navigate the ever-evolving landscape of visual and material research. While rooted in the University of California, Santa Barbara community, our posts are open to all.
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.
Here, we’ll share insights on Digital Art History and Architectural History, highlight new image and data resources, discuss copyright and ethical considerations, and spotlight events that shape our field.
The Red Dot © 2025 is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0
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New origin date of the Red Dot discovered!
We thought we’d launched in 2009, but apparently our history goes back a bit further than that. Recent cave painting discoveries put us at 40,000 years old! It’s weird – why can’t we remember. . . . via the BBC news site Read more
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artlibraries.net, a virtual catalogue for art history
The “meta catalogue” artlibraries.net searches through more than 12 million records across 45 libraries. The records include books, articles (in periodicals, conference papers, festschriften, and exhibition books/catalogues), some archival and photographic materials and online resources. Users can also choose searches from particular libraries or return only digital media. For tips on searching through the multi-language catalogue, click… Read more
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An app to keep you writing: Write or Die
If you suffer from writer’s block, or just need to put “the ‘prod’ in Productivity,” there’s an app for that: Write or Die. The app (for iPad or desktop) works when you preset goals with “consequences for distraction and procrastination” if they are not met. You can even set different modes for the consequences, including… Read more
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Treasure trove of prints discovered at NY Public Library
An enormous and valuable stash of images comprising “a visual encyclopedia” of the US in the 1930s and ’40s has been re-discovered. It comprises 41,000 photographs by Roy Stryker, the founder of the Farm Security Administration’s photography documentation project, now at the Library of Congress. (The 175,000-image FSA collection includes the iconic Dorthea Lange “Dustbowl… Read more
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More Google news: The World Wonders Project
Google’s World Wonders Project, together with partners UNESCO and World Monuments Fund among others, offers armchair travelers an opportunity to experience the built environment in far flung places throughout the globe. The project, once again utilizing Street View, is searchable by location or theme. Additionally, many sites feature videos and user-submitted photography. Read more
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The Getty Research Portal has launched
Finally! After much anticipation, the Getty Research Portal, developed by the Getty Research Institute, is available. It contains links to over 20,000 art history titles, from the Getty and eight other institutions, with plans to keep on growing. And, it’s endorsed by our own Prof. Ann Jensen Adams! Read more