Feb 29, 2012 at 04:30 PM
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Need Help Preserving Your Organization's Archives? There's A Sponsor For That

Preserving archives and artifacts in a digital format that will be accessible for future generations is a daunting task for libraries, museums and other cultural institutions across the world. Luckily, one brand is putting an emphasis, through sponsorship, on helping some of these organizations with their digital preservation efforts. In the past few months, this sponsor has helped the JFK Library, National Baseball Hall of Fame and others; and today it's unveiling an exciting new partnership with the Vatican.


The Massachusetts-based company will be the main sponsor of the 'Lux in Arcana' exhibition, which will reveal for the first time codes, files, scrolls, records and manuscripts of preserved for 400 years in the Vatican Secret Archive.

This sponsorship stems from the a relatively new project at EMC called the 'Information Heritage Initiative', which works to protect and preserve the world's information for future generations and make it globally accessible in digital form for research and education purposes. As part of the initiative, many of the exhibits from 'Lux in Arcana' will be displayed on the exhibition's website, YouTube, and as projections, dynamic graphics and video at the exhibition itself.

"The 'Lux in Arcana' exhibition itself marks a pivotal moment in history where two worlds collide; the old world of history and religion and the new world of state-of-the-art technology," Fred Janssen, Head of Field Marketing EMEA, EMC. "It is a huge privilege to unite the cutting edge data in the present to secure humanities' rich cultural achievements of the past. EMC has chosen to invest its considerable resources in a sponsorship of this nature, rather than a transitory sporting event, as it understands the imperative of preserving history for future generations."

As main sponsor of the exhibit, EMC has the privilege today of revealing that one of the documents to be revealed in the exhibition includes a letter by Marie Antoinette, written in 1793 while she was in prison to someone thought to be Louis XVI's brother Charles Philippe, Count of Artois, who in 1824 became Charles X, King of France.

"The Vatican Secret Archive, a covetous keeper of these ancient and precious documents for 400 years, thanks EMC, the world's leader of Information Technology services, and therefore a thorough keeper of a huge information heritage, for the significant contribution they offered to support the 'Lux in Arcana - The Vatican Secret Archive Reveals Itself' exhibition, further showing the company's sensitivity to making history treasures accessible to a large audience," Luca Carboni, Secretary General, Vatican Secret Archive said.

EMC's Information Heritage Initiative is seeking to help organizations catalogue photographs, diaries, film, letters, ancient writings, music, and visual art. Aside from larger partnerships like today's announcement, EMC also offers smaller grants of $5,000-$15,000 to local organizations for the digital curation and stewardship of their archives through the EMC Heritage Trust Project. To learn more and apply, head over to their website. #activationstag