Principal component analysis of colour measurements of patinas and coating systems for outdoor bronze monuments

Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was applied on colour measurements performed on outdoor bronze patinas and protective coating systems on bronze coupons in order to monitor natural weathering and cleaning effects. PCA chemometric technique is shown to be a powerful tool to analyse the large measurement data set which is needed to characterise these kinds of system. The results are compared with previous work where the CIELAB L*a*b space was used, in order to spot the advantages and disadvantages of both techniques and how they can complete each other in order to set up a workflow when dealing with large datasets of colour measurements. As previously stated, quicker colour variations in the early stage of natural weathering of bronze coupons are characterised, which is mainly due to lightness reduction. PCA analysis helps to visualise the different behaviour upon cleaning procedure of different monument patinas and colour difference reduction due to cleaning. It gives the advantage in a first screening phase to possibly highlight the presence of outliers, check the level of noise in the spectra, and select the variables which carry more information. Its integration in a workflow for colour measurement can help in speeding up the process of later analysing data with the well-established CIELAB system.     

Validating chemical and structural changes in painting materials by principal component analysis of spectroscopic data using internal mineral standards

This work shows the capability of principal component analysis (PCA) to detect molecular, chemical and mineralogical changes in historic painting materials subjected to a thermal ageing test (< 250 °C). To simulate the heat-induced alterations an ageing accelerated process was performed on two sets of samples containing two mineral phases (hydroxyapatite and quartz) and two organic compounds (collagen and albumin). The chosen minerals behaved as internal standards during the tests since they are stable and chemically inert at the tested temperatures. Raman microscopy (RM) was applied to characterise one set of samples made of bone, containing ca. 70% hydroxyapatite and 30% collagen. Attenuated total reflectance-Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy was used to study the other set of samples made of four different quartz/albumin mixtures with quartz contents of 30%, 50%, 70% and 90% (w/w). The aim was to identify the ideal proportion of internal standard to be validated by ATR-FTIR and PCA, determined to be 70%. PCA analyses detected changes in the molecular structures of the organic components while the internal mineral standard remained stable. Moreover, the internal standard IR/Raman bands were constant during the tests and confirmed that the results of PCA analyses were independent of instrumental and technical factors, as well as sample collecting and handling. This demonstrates the potential benefits of our approach to study historical painting materials, which have suffered any type of heat-induced alteration.     

Non-invasive multi-technique investigation of artworks: A new tool for on-the-spot data documentation and analysis

The main advantage of a multi-technique non-invasive artwork investigations relies on the use of different spectroscopic techniques that give rise to complementary information. Despite the artworks complexity, this approach allows great insight into the artwork composition and alteration phases. However, difficulties arise from the great amount of heterogeneous interconnected data that has to be stored for a prompt analysis and preserved. A suitable tool to handle and analyse all the information on the fly is therefore crucial to optimize work, specially in in situ investigations. In this paper we present MOVIDA, a new tool for the data management and analysis of non-invasive investigations in the Cultural Heritage field that not only allows the digital preservation of all the information and knowledge, but can also be used as an analytical tool while the investigation is being developed. The software can be installed on any computer to record, elaborate and analyse the data on-the-spot. All the data generated can be managed within the same application and the information can be easily consulted, compared and related to the corresponding areas of the artwork. The software is self-comprehensive and user-friendly and can be used by all the professionals involved in the investigation and preservation of Cultural Heritage whatever their background and computer skills are.     

Surface analysis of stone materials integrating spatial data and computer vision techniques

This paper deals with a possible application of computer vision techniques in the field of Cultural Heritage. These techniques allow an effective integration of data from different sources. Particular consideration will be given to an accurate geometric analysis of the zone under study in order to detect degradation damage in historical building-stone materials. To this end, we employ a computer vision technique, known as the Shape from Shading method, for which a photographic image of the stone material under consideration is the only input data required. By using this method, it is possible to recover, under some constraints, the shape of the three-dimensional surface of the object from the photographic image. In order to improve the results, in this paper, we implement this technique by using an optimization approach which allows a suitable integration of photographic and spatial data, the latter of which is obtained by a topographical device. We outline the potentialities of the method which mainly consist of two relevant capabilities. The first one is the geometric shape reconstruction of the surface material at a resolution much higher than the one allowed by topographical acquisition. The second one is the correction of the lighting-induced distortions in the photographic image. Such a correction is relevant for further image-based analysis of the degradation of the stone material. Experimental results, obtained by using both photographic and spatial data relative to a pudding stone with degradation, are presented and discussed.     

Geometric characterization of a cylinder-shaped structure from laser scanner data: Development of an analysis tool and its use on a leaning bell tower

The romanesque-byzantine style, 1000 year old leaning bell tower of Caorle (Venice Province, Italy) is a unique masonry structure, characterized by single and double lancet windows harmonically distributed on a cylinder-shaped shaft surmounted by a conic cusp. A terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) survey was carried out in 2011 and some analyses were performed on the resulting point cloud to provide the following: bell tower leaning angle, wall inclination/tapering and radius, local deviation from circular shape, and local curvature. Emphasis was placed on the changes of these quantities with elevation. In order to perform these analyses, a MATLAB/Octave toolbox was developed and is available as supplementary material of this paper. In this way, a reliable picture of the current geometry of the bell tower was obtained. In particular, a correlation between leaning angle (average value 1.4° towards East-South-East) and some surface deformations and damage (bulges, brick displacements or also material loss) was found. These results are useful for cultural heritage preservation purposes.     

Reflections on historical series of art prices: Reitlinger's data revisited

This note of research argues that Reitlinger's series, and all other series such as Meyer's which are based on official auction sales reports, suffer from significant distortions. This distortion is caused by two main factors: a) the absence of data relating to the identity and the profession of the market agents involved in the transactions recorded in time series; b) the criteria of selection adopted to construct the historical series of prices.     

Effects of culture on firm risk-taking: a cross-country and cross-industry analysis

This paper investigates the effects of national culture on firm risk-taking, using a comprehensive dataset covering 50,000 firms in 400 industries in 51 countries. Risk-taking is found to be higher for domestic firms in countries with low uncertainty aversion, low tolerance for hierarchical relationships, and high individualism. Domestic firms in such countries tend to take substantially more risk in industries which are more informationally opaque (e.g., finance, mining, oil refinery, IT). Risk-taking by foreign firms is best explained by the cultural norms of their country of origin. These results hold even after controlling for legal constraints, insurance safety nets, and economic development.     

The data analytics industry and the promises of real-time knowing: perpetuating and deploying a rationality of speed

This article draws upon a sample of 34 data analytics providers in order to explore the rhetorical framing of the speediness of the data analytic solutions that they offer. General perceptions of cultural speed-up frame understandings of organisational life, against this backdrop of data analytics are presented as a potential solution to the need to speed-up and keep-up with the competition. As a result, it is argued that notions of speedy analytics are central to the spread and intensification of data-led decision-making, governance and ordering processes. The promises of real-time knowing are one means by which organisational speed and agility are seen to be achievable. The result is the pushing back of the limits of datafication. This article is concerned with the power of the data analytics industry and the powerful ways in which this industry presents and projects properties and promises onto data and data analytics. It suggests that this industry taps into, cultivates and then attempts to deploy the wider rationality of a need for speed.     

Arts and craftiness: an economic analysis of art heists

We study the incentives that museums face in determining how much resources to invest in the protection of their artwork from theft. We present and analyze a game-theoretic model of art heists that accounts for the strategic interactions between museums’ and art thieves’ decisions and that incorporates several key features of the black market for stolen art. We find that the equilibrium level of security museums choose need not be monotonic in the true market value or the black market value of artwork, i.e., increasing the value of an art piece—whether it is the true market value or the black market value—does not necessarily lead museums to invest more in protecting their artwork. The effects of parameter changes in the model that reflect a shift of public policy depend critically on what type of policy change is considered. For instance, an increase in the penalty imposed for committing art theft cannot raise the amount of theft in equilibrium and could in fact lead museums to increase their level of security. On the other hand, investing more resources on law enforcement agencies so that they are better able to solve art crimes can actually increase the amount of theft in equilibrium by causing museums to spend less on security.     

Market innovation as framing,productive friction and bricolage: an exploration of the personal data market

This paper explores the possibilities offered by recent Science and Technology Studies (STS) research on markets for engaging with market innovation. Although there exist few reflections on how innovation happens in markets, market innovation has not been singularly theorized in STS-inspired market studies. In this paper, we explore the potential analytic utility of different sets of ideas in the field of market studies, such as ‘framing’ [Callon, M. (1998) ‘Introduction: the embeddedness of economic markets in economics’, in The Laws of Markets, ed. M. Callon, Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 1–57; Callon, M. (2007) ‘An essay on the growing contribution of economic markets to the proliferation of the social’, Theory, Culture & Society, vol. 24, no. 7–8, pp. 136–163], ‘productive friction’ [Stark, D. (2009) The Sense of Dissonance: Accounts of Worth in Economic Life, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ] and ‘bricolage’ [MacKenzie, D. & Pardo-Guerra, J. P. (2014) ‘Insurgent capitalism: Island, bricolage and the re-making of finance’, Economy and Society, vol. 43, no. 2, pp. 153–182]. Drawing on our research into the online personal data industry and start-ups developing personal data control products, we put together five sensibilities that we think are of use for broader considerations of market innovation.     

An analysis of building methods: chemical-physical and archaeological analyses of micro-layer coatings on medieval facades in the centre of Genoa

The present research is an attempt to create a link among different disciplines and to confirm stratigraphic observations through chemical analyses. It involved detailed colorimetric examination and in-depth chemical-physical study of the samples taken from the historical centre of Genoa, which enabled connections to be made among many data. This led to the creation of an analytical method that is applicable to various geographical sites. Examinations involved several experimental techniques: X-ray diffractometry, scanning electron microscopy, optical microscopy and infrared spectroscopy; the data were compared with those from the stratigraphic examination. A detailed investigation of the Ligurian climate, including data kindly supplied by the Environment Department of the Provincia di Genova, allowed us to explain the presence of particular chemical substances and suggested how they might have been formed.     

An assemblage of framings and tamings: multi-sited analysis of infrastructures as a methodology

ABSTRACT

The social life of methods – the idea that research methods are an important topic of inquiry in and of themselves – has been receiving increasing interest in scholarship on the organisation of the economy and social life, including Science and Technology Studies (STS). In STS, especially ethnographic methods have been important for decades. This article develops an ethnographic methodology for the study of a very new case that challenges the assumptions underpinning many STS ethnographies. This case is the networked energy infrastructure, and we specifically focus on its risk management and markets. Drawing upon recent STS interest in multi-sited ethnography, the article’s research design is termed the multi-sited analysis of infrastructures (MSAI), and it develops the concepts of framing and taming to focus on meaning formation as mundane sense-making and as technicalised reasoning on different sites. We demonstrate these concepts in a multi-sited ethnography of energy infrastructure and its risk management and market activities in public regulation, special control rooms (including energy trading), and households. The article rounds up by explaining how the application of our methodology contributes to the advancement of interests in multi-sited ethnography, relating our research to the previous work in the fields of STS, infrastructure studies, and their methods.     

Non-invasive spectroscopic measurements on the Il ritratto della figliastra by Giovanni Fattori: identification of pigments and colourimetric analysis

The painting Il ritratto della figliastra (Portrait of the Stepdaughter) by Giovanni Fattori (1889, Gallery of Modern Art, Pitti Palace, Florence) was investigated using non-invasive fibre optics reflectance spectroscopy (FORS). The use of compact and transportable instrumentation made it possible to easily record spectra of the polychrome surface at the restorer’s atelier during the restoration work. The results of colour analysis before and after the cleaning procedure of the painting are reported and discussed, together with an attempt at pigment identification.     

CEPA框架下的广东与澳门旅游合作政策法制研究

由于行政架构与法律制度的差异,较之于国际几大著名湾区和国内长三角地区,粤港澳大湾区的合作发展更显出法律关系的复杂性。政策叠加优势在开拓了粤港澳产业和区域合作发展的更大发展空间的同时,也对粤港澳大湾区跨域性融合发展的制度化建设提出了新的挑战。通过对粤澳旅游合作"先行先试"安排的梳理,阐明粤澳进一步深化旅游合作的政策叠加优势,从而促进粤澳多元文化的交流与融合,推进大湾区高质量发展的文化新高地、新业态的形成。     

Winning hearts and minds: A critical analysis of independent media development in Afghanistan

ABSTRACT

Utilizing a political economic framework, this study investigates the development and expansion of independent media in Afghanistan, focusing on one of the largest private media companies in the country, Moby Group. The company's approach to producing media is tied to its complex location as a translocal/transnational media entity. The company serves a unique population and navigates complex relationships locally and globally (operating in an emerging democratic state negotiating neoliberal market imperatives). This paper argues American-backed development of state-independent media and the rise of private companies such as Moby Group are part of larger geopolitical practices that further U.S. interests and the neoliberal agenda globally.     

Superstars and heavy tails in recorded entertainment: empirical analysis of the market for DVDs

This research presents a systematic empirical analysis of the market for digital versatile discs (DVDs). We examine a sample of 953 DVD titles that appeared on the weekly top-30 sales charts in North America over a 30-month interval. We find that the size distribution of weekly DVD sales revenue does not indicate the presence of increasing returns to information. The empirical results for DVD sales contrast starkly with previous results obtained for motion-picture box-office revenue, where a number of researchers have found evidence of positive feedback in demand. While the distribution of cumulative revenues across DVDs is highly unequal, the DVD market appears not to be characterized by the extreme heavy upper tail that so well describes the winner-take-all nature of the distribution of box-office success across motion pictures.     

News narratives as identity performance: A narrative analysis of Taiwanese and international news coverage of interracial intimacy

This study examines news coverage of an assault upon an interracial couple that happened in Taiwan in 2015. Using narrative analysis from a social identity perspective, the study notes that Taiwanese news media suppressed gender salience in their coverage of this incident to construct a favorable Taiwanese identity; nevertheless, this strategy was performed at the price of reducing the urgency to combat sexism at a societal level. International news media framed the same event as a case of both racism and sexism; however, racism was given different symbolic meanings by different media, with each international news press conceptualizing racism in a way that met its local audience’s identity needs. In addition, both Taiwanese and international news organizations employed several social identity strategies in their news coverage to negotiate desirable international relations. These findings reveal that news media function as agents of international communication in today’s age of globalization.