The Project

by census — last modified 2010-02-18 14:29

	View to the Colosseum, Photograph before 1932	The database of the Census documents antique art and architecture known in the Renaissance. The project focuses on recording which antique monuments were proved to be known where, when and in what state of preservation. The database is not intended to be an encyclopaedic compilation of the reception of antique art. The main data consist of source materials of diverse quality regarding scientific examination and are available for further research.
	The database as a whole is wide-ranging and complex. More than 200.000 entries contain pictorial and written documents, locations, persons, concepts of times and styles, events, research literature and illustrations. The monuments registered amount to about 6.500, the entries of monuments to about 12.000 and the entries of documents to 28.000.

Among the written sources are inventories of collections, travelogues, archival documents, biographies of artists etc. Information on pictorial sources especially include drawings from sketchbooks as well as single sheets and graphic arts. Only a limited range of paintings, sculptures, medals and works of arts and crafts can be found, as frequently the direct knowledge of their antique models cannot be clearly verified due to creative forms of adaptions and assimilations of the antiquity. In addition modern research literature dedicated to the manifold forms and processes of artistic and antiquarian reception of the antiquity are registered in the form of bibliographic references.

View to the Colosseum. Codex Escorialensis, fol. 28 v., before 1509

Marc Aurel on the Capitol in Rome

The project was founded in 1946. The results, initially confined to figural sculptures, were catalogued at first using an index card system at the Warburg Institute in London and at the Institute of Fine Arts in New York.
In collaboration with the Bibliotheca Hertziana (Max-Planck-Institut) in Rome, Census extended its activities and included architecture in its field of research in 1981. It also resolved to establish a computer database supported by the Getty Art History Information Program.

Marco Dente da Ravenna, Marc Aurel, between 1514 and 1528

Since 1995 the Census project is based in the Institut für Kunst- und Bildgeschichte of the Humboldt University of Berlin. In 1997 the Census database was published on CD-Rom; after the year 2000 it has been available on the internet with access control database.

Census was taken up in the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften as a long-term project in 2003 within the "Academies Programme". Due to the intensive financial and technical support provided by the Akademie, Census’ open-access database is available on the internet from June 2007 onwards.