Heritage lovers around the world can now explore a digital reconstruction of the Basilica of St Francis of Assisi, one of central Italy’s best-known churches, and its rich decoration by artists including Cimabue, Giotto and Pietro Lorenzetti.
Preserving Assisi, a new free-to-access digital platform, is dedicated to the basilica—a Unesco World Heritage site comprising two churches, the Upper and Lower basilicas, built directly on top of one another in the first half of the 13th century.
Users can explore the 360 degree panoramic reconstructions of the upper and lower churches, as well as the exterior, from a first-person perspective, navigating with arrows much as they would with Google Maps.
The platform has been built using 27,000 high-definition images of the basilica and its cycles over the course of this and last year
Photo: Haltadefinizione
By selecting individual details, they can explore close-up images of frescoes and pictorial cycles, including Giotto's Homage of a Simple man (around 1300), in the nave of the upper basilica, and Lorenzetti’s Crucifixion (around 1320), in the south transept of the lower basilica.
The platform, which went live on Wednesday, was developed by Haltadefinizione, a company applying ultra-high-resolution imaging technologies to cultural heritage.
Before building the platform, Haltadefinizione took 27,000 high-definition images of the basilica and its cycles over the course of this and last year, allowing for the creation of 116 gigapixel images—extremely detailed images often made with digital image mosaics of multiple high-resolution photographs. Lonzeretti’s Crucifixion was integrated into the platform with an image containing nearly eight billion pixels.
As well as improving access to the site, the developers say the project is intended to create a digital record of it at a particular moment in time, allowing researchers to identify and study changes in the future. The project is ongoing, with digitisation campaigns to continue over the coming months and new content to be progressively added to the platform.
Damage to the Basilica of St Francis of Assisi after the 1997 earthquake
Photo: Haltadefinizione
Photographic campaigns have proved vital to the basilica's preservation in the past. In 1997, two powerful earthquakes measuring 5.7 and 6.0 struck the area in quick succession, severely damaging parts of the basilica, including a cycle by Giotto depicting the life of Saint Francis and works by Cimabue.
A previous photographic campaign by Italian publishing house Franco Cosimo Panini Editore was underway at the time of the earthquakes. The resulting high-definition images have been vital for restoring damaged art.
