Access Hub
© Abbildung: pixabay/Vilkasss/KI-generiert

The Access Hub provides an overview of relevant workshops and conferences, calls for proposals, as well as resources on the topic of “Access to Cultural Goods in Digital Change” – without claiming to be complete. We welcome suggestions for additions (email: nora.kluck@uni-muenster.de).

If you have any questions or wish to submit an application, please contact the relevant advertising organisation directly.

  • Conferences & Workshops

    Call for Papers & Participation

    Recordings

  • Calls, Jobs & Scholarships

    • Vesuvius Challenge: This competition focuses on digital, computer-assisted analysis techniques for deciphering the charred papyri from the library of Herculaneum. In this interdisciplinary project, papyrologists are collaborating with computer scientists and specialists in computer vision, imaging, 3D animation and AI to analyse high-resolution raw data on the finest structures in the charred papyri from the European Synchrotron in Grenoble, to distinguish between layers, distinguish remnants of charred ink from remnants of charred papyrus, detect writing, and finally create a virtual model of the unrolled ancient textual artefacts, among which numerous as yet unknown texts are believed to be present. The raw scan data is freely available online. Prize money has been offered for specific contributions to this project.
    • Call for Special Issues of the open-access online journal “Philosophy & Digitality (P&D)”, published by the Cologne-based specialist information service for philosophy. A special issue focuses on one particular aspect or perspective of the philosophy of digitality. The journal welcomes contributions on the aesthetical, ethical, political, ontological, and epistemological dimensions of digitalization. Interested editors can submit a concept until the 15th of April 2027 to info@phidi.org. After a positive review of the concept by the editorial board of the journal towards the middle of the year, the special issue will then be scheduled for 2028. 

  • Resources

    • DFG Practical Guidelines on Digitisation (current version from 2022) provide a fundamental basis for DFG-funded digitisation projects in its “Digitisation and Indexing” programme: They formulate standards and contain information on organisational, methodological and technical issues in the context of digitising and indexing objects relevant for research.

    • The DFG collaborative project “Digitalisierung und Bereitstellung (noch) rechtebewehrter Objekte” presents its pilot phase in a blog which serves to facilitate communication between the project consortium and its target groups and the wider public within academic and collection institutions. As part of a two-year pilot phase, the German Research Foundation (DFG) is exploring legal, technical and organisational solutions for the digitisation and scholarly-standard provision of collection objects in archives, libraries and museums that are (still) subject to copyright, with a view to further developing its funding programmes. 

    • Europeana: Discover Europe’s digital cultural heritage provides cultural heritage enthusiasts, professionals, teachers, and researchers with access to Europe’s digital cultural heritage. Europeana gives access to millions of items from providing institutions across Europe, e. g. to artworks, books, music, and videos.

    • The Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek – Kultur und Wissen online (German Digital Library) is a database of cultural objects where books or full texts can be read or downloaded in their entirety, provided they are no longer subject to legal restrictions. In addition to books and texts, there are also archival materials, images and photographs, sculptures, pieces of music and other audio documents, films and sheet music, paintings, manuscripts and much more.

    • The Sammlung Zeitgenössische Stadtgeschichte(n) is a web archive of the Berlin State Digital Library and a pilot project run by the Zentral- und Landesbibliothek Berlin (ZLB) for web archiving, in fulfilment of its duty to preserve cultural heritage. As part of this, selected websites from Berlin are saved, archived and made available to users at regular intervals. 

    • museum-digital is a joint initiative by museums and museum associations. It helps museums to present their collections online. All published objects can be searched collectively on museum-digital:global.

    • BnF Gallica is the digital library of the Bibliothèque nationale de France and its partners. It offers free and open access to several million digitized documents from all periods and all media.

    • Art UK offers free digital access to the UK’s public art collections. It brings together over 700,000 artworks from 3,500 institutions – museums, libraries, town halls, hospitals – as well as public artworks in urban spaces such as sculptures and murals.

    • Wikimedia Commons is a collection of more than 130 million freely usable media files to which anyone can contribute.

    • Internet Archive is a non-profit library of millions of free texts, movies, software, music, websites, and more.

    • International Documents on the Protection of Cultural Goods, aggregated by Prof. Dr. Ruben Apressyan, Senior Researcher at the Centre for Advanced Study “Access to Cultural Goods in Digital Change”.

    • Digital History of Virtual Museums: A project started by by Associate Professor Nadezhda Povroznik, now hosted at the Technische Universität Darmstadt.

    • “Koloniale Kontexte in Bibliotheken” discusses the legal framework as well as ethical and institutional issues that must be taken into account when providing online access to digitised items from collections with colonial origins. In addition to providing a basic overview, the guide offers specific recommendations for libraries on topics such as provenance research, acquisitions, collection presentation, digital access, and metadata.

    • Guidelines on museum accessibility in China, as published by the UNESCO office in Beijing in cooperation with the Global Disability Fund and the Chines Museums Association in 2025.

    • Center for Digital Humanities der Universität Münster: The Center for Digital Humanities (CDH) is an interest group of digital researchers from different faculties and handles the scientific shaping of the thematic field of Digital Humanities at Münster.

    • Research project “The Problems of Access to Cultural Heritage in the Digital Age” at Palacký University Olomouc (Czech Republic) (Principal Investigator: doc. Mgr. Pavel Zahrádka, PhD, Senior Fellow of the Centre for Advanced Study “Access to Cultural Goods in Digital Change”)

    • Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (CDLI): The CDLI represents the efforts of an international group of Assyriologists, museum curators and historians of science to make available through the internet the form and content of cuneiform inscriptions dating from the beginning of writing, ca. 3350 BC. Thereby, the CDLI is opening pathways to the rich historical tradition of the ancient Middle East. In close collaboration with researchers, museums and an engaged public, the project seeks to unharness the extraordinary content of these earliest witnesses to our shared world heritage.

    • DELFT – Digitalisierung EthnoLogischer FilmbesTand: Project for the digitisation and digitalisation of the ethnological film inventory of 1,952 films of the former Institut für den Wissenschaftlichen Film (IWF) by the Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB) Hannover.

    • “Mapping German Film Exile” is an online platform based on the personal files that Günter Peter Straschek compiled between 1976 and 2009 on the historical exile of filmmakers from Nazi Germany, which are now housed in the Exile Archive of the German National Library in Frankfurt. The platform allows users to search the database of the Straschek files and the results of a research project focusing on filmmaking in exile.

    • Virtual exhibition: “Meissener Porzellan im virtuellen Fokus”: This exhibition brings the famous Meissen porcelain, particularly that of the 18th century, to digital life. The 3D models allow visitors to view the objects up close and discover details of the decoration, as well as signs of wear or restoration. The exhibition was developed as part of a university seminar at Dresden University of Technology under the direction of PD Dr Angela Dreßen, Senior Fellow of the Centre for Advanced Study “Access to Cultural Goods in Digital Change”, and was realised in collaboration with the Meissen Porcelain Museum.

    • National Theatre at Home offers free streaming of plays from the Royal National Theatre in London.

    • Digital Theatre at the Augsburg State Theatre: The Digital Theatre explores performing on digital stages with 360° video in virtual reality, with hybrid productions that combine the physical stage space with the virtual, with streaming services that allow participation, and with meet-up formats that also work online.

    • „How can Equitable Access to Heritage help solve Global Challenges?“: Record of the UNESCO Forum in Paris on 29 April 2026.

    • Kunstgeschichte im digitalen Zeitalter: Lehre – Forschung – Dissemination is a commemorative volume marking the 60th birthday of Maria Effinger, featuring contributions from Prof. Dr Ursula Frohne, Co-Director of the Centre for Advanced Study “Access to Cultural Goods in Digital Change”, as well as the Centre’s Senior Fellows, Prof. Dr Henry Keazor and Prof. Dr Hubertus Kohle.