The performing arts domain, addressing the ephemeral nature of its main study subject, the performance, calls upon Digital Humanities’ techniques to document, record and analyse the performative event, thus offering a new perspective to research and education. In this context, many digital projects have been completed, including digitising art archives, creating databases of art productions and developing metadata schemas and conceptual models. The study of these efforts revealed a need for a universal and comprehensive way of documenting performance. This article, which benefitted from the experience gained thus far in the performing arts in the digital world, attempts to unify the domain’s acquired knowledge and organise it in an ontology. While the overall success of such a project proved to be greater than the scope of this research, we propose a core ontology for the performing arts, which has the potential to evolve in the future.
McGillivrayG. The performance archive: detritus or historical record? In: McGillivrayG (ed.) Scrapbooks, snapshots and memorabilia: hidden archives of performance. (pp. 11–28) Bern: Peter Lang, 2011.
2.
SmithB.Introduction: dramatic forays into IT: working computers with a broom handle & approaches to building digital archives. In: LycourisSSmithB (eds) Creating digital performance resources a guide to good practice. Oxford: Oxbow, 2002, pp. 1–8.
3.
Escobar VarelaMLeeNH. Language documentation: a reference point for theatre and performance archives?Int J Perf Art Digit Media2018; 14(1): 17–33.
4.
CaplanD.Notes from the frontier: digital scholarship and the future of theatre studies. Theatre J2015; 67(2): 347–359.
5.
SaltzD.Performing arts. In: SchreibmanSSiemensRUnsworthJ (eds) A companion to digital humanities. (Ch. 11) Oxford: Blackwell, 2004.
6.
CoxJ.The Abbey Theatre Digital Archive: a digitization project with dramatic impact. Insights2017; 30(3): 20–30.
7.
FeilmayrCWößW.An analysis of ontologies and their success factors for application to business. Data Knowl Eng2016; 101: 1–23.
8.
ArpRSmithBSpearAD.Building ontologies with basic formal ontology. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2015.
BorgoSFerrarioRGengemiA, et al. DOLCE: a descriptive ontology for linguistic and cognitive engineering. Appl Ontol2022; 17(1): 45–69.
12.
PresuttiVGangemiA.DS Ultralite Ultralite and its main ontology design patterns. In: HitzlerPGangemiAJanowiczK, et al. (eds) Ontology engineering with ontology design patterns. Amsterdam: IOS Press, 2016, pp. 81–103.
13.
DotyC.The difficulty of an ontology of live performance. Interactions2013; 9(1): 1–14.
SantT. Documenting performance. An introduction. In: SantT (ed.) Documenting performance. The context and processes of digital curation and archiving. London: Bloomsbury, 2017, pp. 1–12.
19.
WolterstorffN.Toward an ontology of artworks. Noûs1975; 9(2): 115–142.
20.
ShawRLarsonR.Event representation in temporal and geographic context. In: 12th European conference on research and advanced technology for digital libraries (ECDL’08), Aarhus, 14–19 September 2008, pp. 415–418. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-540-87599-4_50.
21.
ShawRTroncyRHardmanL. LODE: linking open descriptions of events. In: Asian semantic web conference (ASWC 2009), Shanghai, China, 6–9 December 2009, pp. 153–167, https://cidoc-crm.org/sites/default/files/14783A.pdf (accessed 5 November 2023).
22.
CarrollN.Interpretation, theatrical performance, and ontology. J Aesthet Art Critic2001; 59: 313–316.
23.
OsipovichD.What is a theatrical performance?J Aesthet Art Critic2006; 64(4): 461–470.
24.
PooleLDMackworthKA.Artificial intelligence: foundations of computational agents. 3rd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023.
EstermannBJulienF.A linked digital future for the performing arts: leveraging synergies along the value chain. Canadian Arts Presenting Association (CAPACOA) in cooperation with the Bern University of Applied Sciences, 2019, https://linkeddigitalfuture.ca/research/initial-research/
