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Alumni Spotlight: Hanna Wiegers ’16 describes her research opportunities

May 12, 2017

I first worked with the Wired! Lab first as a research assistant for Sara Galletti‘s Paris of Waters project. Over the course of my tenure as her assistant, which included a summer fellowship in the lab, I translated tomes of 16th and 17th century French city records in order to generate a database of any entries concerning water and its related infrastructure. This project enabled me to become familiar with the community in the Wired! Lab, and I ultimately pursued a distinction project during my senior year with Caroline Bruzelius. For this project, I studied a thirteenth century Dominican convent in Paris, the Couvent Saint Jacques, that was eventually destroyed in the aftermath of the French Revolution. I aimed to create a digital three-dimensional model of the building to recover its original appearance. While I never completed the model, my colleague in my masters program at Columbia did create one that reflects both of our research on the convent’s complex. My contribution was primarily in terms of tombs: who was buried in this complex, why was this convent an important burial ground, and how did the location of burial within the church reflect a social hierarchy? I continue to study how digital technologies can enhance more conventional art historical studies, especially in the realm of architecture.

 

Image Credits: Hanna Wiegers