By Eunice Masunungure

THERE are key issues that need to be underlined when dealing with traditional artefacts, particularly preservation, facelifting and digitisation.

This comes on the backdrop of the French pledge to give the Great Zimbabwe Monument and National Archives of Zimbabwe a face-lift in a bid to deepen the two countries’ bilateral relations.

On May 9 2021, Switzerland also pledged material support towards the establishment of the Museum of African Liberation to be constructed in Harare.

Addressing the media after meeting President Emmerson Mnangagwa, Swiss Ambassador to Zimbabwe Niculin Jager said his country was an honest broker and had been invited to take part in the project.

“We believe the project would be a milestone for African history and liberation, and Switzerland has a broad understanding of digitisation and archiving, so we have been invited to join the endeavour of this project through archiving and digitisation,” he said.

The Swiss Ambassador said they would also provide access to documents from the Switzerland Solidarity Movement that played a key role in Africa’s struggle for self-determination.

The Museum of African Liberation, to be constructed in Harare opposite Warren Park 1 High School, is a continental project meant to document, preserve, protect and promote the continent’s liberation legacy.

“Is facelifting or upgrading an artefact not artificialising?” asked Makanaka Manatsa (not real name) from Harare.

Another Harare resident asked: “Is not digital reproduction compromising the original or does reproduction retain originality?

“Artefacts must speak our stories and reflect on us.”

The general concern about possible alterations in digitisation of artefacts is a question of possibility of changes in the process.

It is also a question of possible changes in the event of facelifting monuments.

Without repeating that such artefacts defy the colonial discourse by silently narrating the African story, the yearning is for museums to shape and represent the evolution of Zimbabwean people and culture in a timeless manner, but still reflecting originality.

Cultural institutions, such as museums and historical sites, house remarkable collections of cultural artefacts. 

Bearing this in mind, digitisation reproduces a physical object such as an art object from an artefact into photographs of the item, then transferring the photographs to a digital medium. 

Digital files are managed with the use of software programmes and may be read, compressed, transferred and retrieved over computer networks then made accessible and viewed on computer monitors. 

This helps to avail the artefacts on the internet for research, teaching, publication and communication.

For instance, cultural institutions are investing in digital projects for access to reduce over-handling of material and ‘public relations’.

Through digital imaging, information and content may be delivered directly to end-users and can be retrieved remotely. Image quality can be quite good and is often enhanced, with capabilities continuously improving. (Conway, 2000) 

Flexibility of the digital material is another advantage. 

Digitised resources serve local, national and international needs. 

Digitisation also allows for extended data recovery and enabling far-away scholarship access.

Since the data is not ‘fixed’, as with paper or printed text, it is easy to reformat, edit and print. (Smith, 2000, p.3)

However, the challenge is of possible alterations that may be put in. 

While computer enhancements might allow for more in-depth analysis, as argued by Stefano (2000:14), institutions need to realise that digital resources are institutional assets in their own right and not merely surrogates of an analogy object; they tend to give a managed image. (Kenney & Rieger, 2000:6)

Pundits contend digitisation and face-lifting breathe new life into older institutions, thus they tend to replace the latter, while poor quality of surrogates is a disadvantage because they might not satisfy users. (Stefano, 2000: 13)

Ease of access to a digital collection leads to high expectations of end-users. 

There is a tendency to believe that everything is available online, that every piece of information is true and accurate and that everything available online is free. 

Rarely do users understand or appreciate the scope of the collection and its relationship to other parts of the collection. (Ingram, 2000, p. 19)

Traditional cultural institutions such as museums and artefacts are often perceived to be authentic because they narrate the experiences of the maker. (Beamsley, 1999:361-62) 

The scholar further argues the problem is that it cannot be ascertained whether a digital form or reproduction is what it says it is.

There is also possible electronic manipulation.

Of course, those involved must know that there is need for professionalism in archivists and that they need to promote scholarship.

There is need to avoid any activities that may compromise institutions or the collections as consented elsewhere  that special collections must not suppress originality for self-interest.(Association of College and Research Libraries, 1992)

This is reminiscent of lack of clarity behind the Egyptian Sphynx due to possible reproduction.

Scholars concur that when the nose of the Sphinx was smashed, it got disfigured to the extent it lost its identity in the process. Arabs refer to the Sphinx as ‘abul hol’ or ‘father of terror’.

In the same manner, what is done to artefacts must, at the end of the day, leave the clear identity of the artefact intact.