Material / Image Research Lab (MIRL)

The Central Coast Native American Modern to Contemporary Art Archive is a digital repository showcasing Native American artists from California’s Central Coast. Launched in Fall 2023, it addresses the historical underrepresentation of modern and contemporary Native artworks by featuring works on JSTOR Forum and, eventually, an open-access website.

Developed by staff and student interns from the Material / Image Research Lab, the project offers internship opportunities in digital curation and archival research, enriching art history with local voices and innovative, community-driven practices alongside scholarly collaboration. This platform will be open to all community members, both on JSTOR as well as an open-access web site.

https://forum.jstor.org/#/projects/150618

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MIRL is supporting Object Histories, Making, and Meaning in the Andes as part of the Digital Infrastructure for Object-Based Storytelling Beyond the Academy initiative, in collaboration with the Archives, Memory, and Preservation Lab, and Neogranadina. Developed by Alicia Boswell and María Lumbreras (History of Art & Architecture, CLAIR), this project explores four Andean objects from UCSB’s AD&A Museum:
-A Paracas textile fragment with a wooden weaving tool (circa 500 BCE)
-A khipu, an Inka-period cord-recording device (15th century)
-Two Colonial-era paintings: Virgin and Child and St. Rose of Lima
The project reconstructs these objects’ histories through visual and technical studies, including radiocarbon dating of the Paracas textile and quipu and hyperspectral imaging of the paintings to analyze pigments and restoration. A bilingual (English/Spanish) virtual exhibition will make these findings accessible to descendant communities, scholars, and the public.

MIRL provides a digital framework, ensuring the project aligns with sustainable, open-source principles. Through low-cost 3D scanning and imaging, the project establishes best practices for digital storytelling. Object Histories, Making, and Meaning in the Andes reconnects these artworks with their origins, offering a model for ethical and community-centered digital engagement.

The Material / Image Research Lab (MIRL) is collaborating with the Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) on the Color Film Emergency Project, funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities. This initiative focuses on preserving at-risk 35mm architectural slide collections, including a subset of David Harby’s Egypt slides, which document historic architecture and cultural heritage. The project involves digitizing, cataloging, and preparing these materials for publication in SAHARA on JSTOR, ensuring long-term accessibility. It also provides students with hands-on training in archival and digital preservation, equipping them with valuable skills while contributing to the conservation of these important visual resources.

https://www.jstor.org/site/sahara/ColorFilmEmergencyProject/

This project focuses on the systematic documentation, photography, and cataloging of newly acquired Ancient Americas artworks from the AD&A Museum. By addressing questions related to provenance, material composition, cultural significance, and historical context, the project seeks to enhance the accessibility and understanding of these objects within MIRL’s teaching collection. Each object will be photographed to produce high-quality visual records, and detailed metadata will be created or updated to refine catalog entries. Where gaps in information exist, additional research will be conducted to provide a more comprehensive understanding. Central to the project is the implementation of rigorous object-handling and preservation protocols, ensuring the long-term care and integrity of these culturally significant artifacts. This work contributes to advancing collections management practices and deepening scholarly engagement with the Ancient Americas.

This expansive project explores the relationship between art history and archeology in utilizing formal analysis skills and digital humanities methods, yet with archeological objects. The project involved intensive digitization, documentation, and the development of metadata for 525 illustrations and photographs of Chimu and Lambayeque objects from approximately 60 burial sites in Farfan, Peru. 

This project centers on the digitization of a compelling collection of vernacular photographs and postcards from North Africa and Europe, dating to the 1920s and 1930s. These materials offer valuable insights into everyday life, travel, and cross-cultural encounters during the interwar period. Photographs and postcards from this era often served as tools of representation, reflecting both personal narratives and broader societal trends. In colonial contexts, these images reveal complex dynamics of power, cultural exchange, and visual propaganda, capturing how colonized spaces and peoples were depicted for European audiences. Beyond their colonial implications, the materials also illuminate local perspectives, social customs, and the ways photography functioned as a medium of memory and connection. By digitizing and preserving this collection, the project contributes to the study of visual culture, colonial histories, and the role of photography in shaping collective and individual identities during a pivotal historical moment.