Item talk:Q19104

The E.A.T. Knowledge Graph (Wikbase Project Page)

Background

Experiments in Art and Technology (A.E.T.)was an organization founded in 1966 by artists Robert Rauschenberg and Robert Whitman, along with engineers Billy Klüver and Fred Waldhaer. Active from the mid-1960s to the late 1970s, E.A.T. fostered collaborations between artists and engineers on a wide range of projects, including avant-garde artworks and performances, with the explicit goal of transforming both fields. Its mission states: "To firmly establish the artists' free access to technology, engineering and the technical processes is not only a cultural, educational or aesthetic problem but amounts in fact to an organic social revolution." The goal of the Knowledge Graph Project, developed by the Semantic Lab, is to represent this influential art initiative as knowledge graphs using scalable and transferable methods and tools.

Project Description

The E.A.T. Knowledge Graph Project applies semantic web principles and linked data technologies to primary and secondary sources documenting and describing the E.A.T. initiative. It is part of an ongoing collaboration with the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation Archives and the executive director of E.A.T., Julie Martin.

Sources

Robert Rauschenberg Foundation Archives' E.A.T. Collection
The most extensive data source consists of a collection of 141 archival materials from the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation Archives. This collection includes includes primarily textual documents related to E.A.T.’s initial phase. The institutional metadata associated with these materials were also converted into linked data.

Edge-notched Cards [ ingested ]
Another source of data was a collection of yellow McBee edge-notched cards created by the E.A.T. Technical Services Program and preserved at the Getty Research Institute's Experiments in Art and Technology records archival collection. (Additional information about the Getty's work understanding the long-term impact of experimental arts organization E.A.T. can be found HERE.) The goal of the program was to connect artists with engineers to facilitate collaborations. Information was documented on more than 300 cards, each listing an engineer's name, area of expertise, location, and affiliations. Handwritten notes on the backs of the cards indicated potential matches with artists based on shared project interests. For the pilot phase, we randomly selected a sample of 30 cards. The resulting graph represents 30 engineers and 85 artists. A visualization tool enables users to view, sort, and arrange scans of the cards.

E.A.T. Bibliography [ ingested ]
The E.A.T. Bibliography [1] is a published list of over 600 bibliographic references of printed material (books, articles, catalogs, and notices) related to the E.A.T. movement and activities from 1965 to 1980. We have converted a subset of 447 covering the period from 1965 to 1969. Each bibliographic reference is linked to its item pages and, if available, to the digital copy of the referenced document. Further details can be found on the E.A.T. Bibliography Wikibase project page. A browsable version of the E.A.T. Bibliography, driven by SPARQL queries, has been developed for online navigation.

Story of E.A.T. [ ingested ]
Story of E.A.T. Part I and Story of E.A.T. Part II dated 2001 and written by Billy Klüver.

[1] Klüver, B. (1980). E.A.T. bibliography: August 12, 1965-January 18, 1980. New York: Experiments in Art and Technology.
[2] Klüver, B. (2001). The story of E.A.T.: Experiments in Art and Technology, 1960-2001.

Tools

[ in progress ]

Scope

Performance Records

Property ID	Property label	Property description	Source
P117	role	part assumed by an entity with relation to a group, event, production, or institution. Created alongside group discussions and ISR project. Should be used as a qualifier.	Derived from Wikidata.
P125	location	location of the object, structure or event.	Derived from Wikidata.
P126	performer	actor, musician, band or other performer associated with this role or musical work. To be used as a qualifier when there is no room to use role.	Derived from Wikidata.
P127	work performed	used to connect an event or performance to an artwork.	Similar to Music Ontology’s performance_of.
P128	performance instance	used to connect an artwork to a performance.	Similar to Music Ontology’s performed_in.
P131	sub-event	used to connect an event to a performance.	Derived from Schema.org and the Carnegie Hall Project.
P132	super-event	used to connect a performance to an event.	Derived from Schema.org and the Carnegie Hall Project.
P185	uses	item or concept used by the subject or in the operation	Derived from Wikidata.

Project Data

The dataset is available on Zenodo at https://zenodo.org/records/14031252; GitHub at https://github.com/SemanticLab/data-export; Semantic Lab Wikibase at https://base.semlab.io/wiki.

Note: For a general overview of the data available on the Semantic Lab Wikibase and various methods for querying it, please visit the Semantic Lab Wikibase homepage.

General E.A.T. Knowledge Graph Project Data

All records associated with the E.A.T. Knowledge Graph Project
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yjqjm9jq

All people associated with the E.A.T. E.A.T. Knowledge Graph Project
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yhsxvcyj

All artworks associated with the E.A.T. E.A.T. Knowledge Graph Project
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yezg3jbr

All events associated with the E.A.T. E.A.T. Knowledge Graph Project
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yew6c7ar

Examples of Research Questions and Queries

Question: What are all of Robert Rauschenberg’s works within this Wikibase?
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yemjrecw

Question: Who were all of the performers of the piece Pelican?
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/ydlnbyzl

Question: What performances did Deborah Hay perform in?
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yz7za5a8

Question: What pieces were performed at the First New York Theater Rally?
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yjpsa27h
or SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yztfbk69

Question: In what performances did Robert Rauschenberg and Alex Hay perform together?
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/yk2dvm9b

Question: What are the technologies, materials, and techniques utilized by E.A.T?
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/2g2k6zgx

Question: Who sponsored events associated with E.A.T?
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/2zb4k8yg

Question: What locations are mentioned in the E.A.T documents?
SPARQL Query: https://tinyurl.com/2kcbnb4t