Matt Westerby
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qwesterby.bsky.social
Matt Westerby
@qwesterby.bsky.social
Medieval art | illuminated manuscripts and illustrated rare books | DH and digital | art history | cats 🐈. HoH 🦻🏻. All views are my own.
"The paradigm, not the palace, becomes the problem."

Pamela Patton's essay "Is Spain “Different”? Self-Segregation, Exclusion, and the Future of Medieval Iberian Studies" is a must read in a superb Speculum centennial issue.

@pamelapatton.bsky.social
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
Is Spain “Different”? Self-Segregation, Exclusion, and the Future of Medieval Iberian Studies | Speculum: Vol 101, No 1
www.journals.uchicago.edu
January 4, 2026 at 5:58 PM
Index fans! "Towards a Linked Open Index: Reconciling Museum Records to Wikidata for Index of American Design Constituents" by Abigail Foster, Samantha Norling, and me, in the Journal of Open Humanities Data doi.org/10.5334/johd...

#indexofamericandesign
#federalartproject
#linkedopendata
#wikidata
Towards a Linked Open Index: Reconciling Museum Records to Wikidata for Index of American Design Constituents | Journal of Open Humanities Data
doi.org
January 2, 2026 at 3:22 PM
Pluribus is a fantastic TV show and I’m a fan. And I just realized the premise was captured in one legendary Star Trek story — Tuvix.

#pluribus
#tuvix
#startrekvoyager
December 20, 2025 at 12:51 AM
Add the library and we have three walled cities?
though I may currently work at a museum, I'm really more of a sleeper agent in this war of attrition
slow day in the office so figured we'd start some beef with museums
December 19, 2025 at 3:46 PM
Reposted by Matt Westerby
Our new data article explores funding trends in art history over the past 60 years with Wikidata facilitating cross-institutional collaboration, with @qwesterby.bsky.social and Lidia Ferrara, published in Journal of Open Humanities Data
openhumanitiesdata.metajnl.com/articles/10....

#ArtHistory
A Practical Join: Using Wikidata to Aggregate Awards and Affiliations Data from Residential Fellowship Programs in Art History | Journal of Open Humanities Data
openhumanitiesdata.metajnl.com
December 18, 2025 at 11:33 PM
Have you ever been inordinately upset with yourself for losing one glove from a pair you really liked?
November 25, 2025 at 7:48 PM
More reason to steer towards small AI models, that you can run on your own computer.
November 25, 2025 at 1:33 PM
Fantastic opportunity for a senior art historian of premodern art or architecture 👀
🚨🚨🚨 Major announcement!!!
I am extremely pleased to announce that HAA is searching for a senior, endowed position in premodern art or architecture. The subfield is wide open. Please spread the word and encourage curious scholars to write to me with questions! 🚨🚨🚨

cfopitt.taleo.net/careersectio...
William S. Dietrich II Professor of Premodern Arts and/or Architecture
Click the link provided to see the complete job description.
cfopitt.taleo.net
October 30, 2025 at 10:09 PM
Applications for fellowships in art history at many institutions are open this fall. Read a short blog post at HistPhil that I wrote with @nancyum.bsky.social on "Taking the Long View: Gauging the Impact of Residential Fellowships in Art History over the Decades." histphil.org/2025/09/08/t...
Taking the Long View: Gauging the Impact of Residential Fellowships in Art History over the Decades
Editors’ Note: Nancy Um and Matthew Westerby introduce findings from the Scholars Data Project, hosted by the Association of Research Institutes in Art History, on residential fellowships spo…
histphil.org
September 8, 2025 at 4:24 PM
Reposted by Matt Westerby
I'm always looking for new videos to introduce digital humanities at the beginning of the semester. Most are usually too specialist or lecture-y. But this video essay by @tesstess.bsky.social, "Digital Humanities, or: The Broken Record of Everything," nails it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3Nn...
Digital Humanities, or: The Broken Record of Everything
YouTube video by DH Cologne
www.youtube.com
August 7, 2025 at 6:01 PM
Reposted by Matt Westerby
"Literary style is not a puzzle you solve to get a little information treat" is my new motto.
This article is going to turn me into the Joker. Literary style is not a puzzle you solve to get a little information treat 😩😩😩
June 22, 2025 at 12:08 PM
Reposted by Matt Westerby
I'll be speaking on IIIF Community Call *this Wednesday*. Drop by if you want to hear about (and play with!) liiive.now!
Join us April 9 at 9am PT / 17:00 UTC for our next #IIIF Community Call.

@aboutgeo.bsky.social will demo liiive.now, a real-time collaborative viewing and & annotation platform.

Zoom link on the Community Calendar: iiif.io/community
April 7, 2025 at 3:59 PM
Your input needed! ℹ️ 🎨🚨
The National Gallery of Art wants to hear from you about visual arts research. Please take the survey – it's 10 minutes or less! www.surveymonkey.com/r/nga-schola...

#arthistory #architecturalhistory #digitalarthistory #artmuseums #GLAMS #GLAMresearch
Visual Arts Research Survey
Take this survey powered by surveymonkey.com. Create your own surveys for free.
www.surveymonkey.com
February 28, 2025 at 10:09 PM
Reposted by Matt Westerby
"Why not build [public interest tech] from the communities that exist around our public institutions, such as schools, colleges, community centres?... Platforms designed for communities are much more likely to hold to social values than platforms built for profit" (See also... [1/2])
🙋🏾‍♂️🤳 Exploring new concepts for a people-powered internet
An excerpt of Nick Couldry’s new book, The Space of the World
newpublic.substack.com
January 12, 2025 at 3:44 PM
Maybe I'll see you at Costco tomorrow while panic buying imported goods?
January 12, 2025 at 12:52 AM
Someone wants to rename the Gulf of Mexico to 'Mare Nostrum' apparently?
January 7, 2025 at 11:44 PM
Sierra On-Line Christmas Card from 1986 ❤️ 🦌
Attention software enthusiasts! Check out hidden gems handpicked by Internet Archive staff: blog.archive.org/2024/12/02/s...

Also, consider supporting Universal Access to All Knowledge: archive.org/donate/?orig...
December 5, 2024 at 6:31 PM
MFW you learn the S side of the circle of DiSC, for "Steadiness," originally stood for "Submission." 🤔🤔🤔

Oh, and the inventor of DiSC, William Marston, also created Wonder Woman!
December 5, 2024 at 6:29 PM
Reposted by Matt Westerby
“Annotating Upstream: Digital Scholars, Art History, and the Interoperable Image” by Matthew J. Westerby: doi.org/10.16995/olh... Published as part of the #OLHjournal Cultural Heritage Data for Research: Opening Museum Collections, Project Data and Digital Images for Research, Query and Discovery SC
Annotating Upstream: Digital Scholars, Art History, and the Interoperable Image
Written primarily from the position of an art historian engaged in digital research and data-intensive projects, this essay explores annotations on interoperable images and the possibility for annotat...
doi.org
November 25, 2024 at 10:05 AM
✍️ just in time for Thanksgiving travel – a new thing to read! "Annotating Upstream: Digital Scholars, Art History, and the Interoperable Image." I'm grateful to our editor Angela Dressen for this special edition and the team at OLH @openlibhums.bsky.social

olh.openlibhums.org/article/id/1...
Annotating Upstream: Digital Scholars, Art History, and the Interoperable Image
Written primarily from the position of an art historian engaged in digital research and data-intensive projects, this essay explores annotations on interoperable images and the possibility for annotat...
olh.openlibhums.org
November 25, 2024 at 3:56 PM
🚨 ICMA folks and area scholars! 🚨 Join for an ICMA pop up in Washington DC with a curator-led tour of the exhibition 'An Epic of Kings: The Great Mongol Shahnama' on Friday December 6 at the National Museum of Asian Art. Register here!

www.medievalart.org/icma-news/ic...
ICMA in DC: Exhibition tour of "An Epic of Kings: The Great Mongol Shahnama" - Friday 6 December 2024. Register today! — International Center of Medieval Art
ICMA in Washington DC Exhibition tour of  An Epic of Kings: The Great Mongol Shahnama Friday 6 December 2024, in person 1:30–3pm ET National Museum of Asian Art, Washington, DC Regist...
www.medievalart.org
October 23, 2024 at 9:10 PM
Reposted by Matt Westerby
"The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog."
- Glamorizes hustle culture
- Speciest
- Was taught to you in elementary school

"Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow."
- Metal as fuck
- Implies that you are a wizard
- No one will know you are testing out a font
October 15, 2024 at 8:16 PM
Reposted by Matt Westerby
I say this with love and as a professor of art history: the report on this study is junk. It’s not measuring a response to “real art” vs “reprints”; it’s measuring “seeing art in a museum” vs “seeing it on googles while in an MRI machine.” www.theguardian.com/science/2024...
Real art in museums stimulates brain much more than reprints, study finds
Scientists in Netherlands using eye-tracking and MRI scans found ‘enormous difference’ between genuine works and posters
www.theguardian.com
October 3, 2024 at 1:36 PM
Hey, Bluesky now has over 10 million users, and I was #75,227! Woot!
September 30, 2024 at 11:55 PM