Page - 251 - in Limina - Grazer theologische Perspektiven, Volume 3:2

251 | www.limina-graz.eu Chiara Zuanni | Heritage in a digital world the life of the city, thus moving from being purely an engaging visualisation of visitors’ experiences in the museum (as many social media walls tend to be) to suggest a real-life recording of contemporary life in the city hosting the museum. In 2017, the V&A acquired a local copy of the Chinese social media platform WeChat, while between 2017 and 2020, the “Collecting So- cial Photography” project by a group of Scandinavian museums, drew on a series of crowdsourcing experiments aimed at capturing everyday mo- bile images of specific areas of a city or on a theme (Hartig [n. d.]). Other museums, despite demonstrating interest in social media and other digital cultural objects (e. g. memes), have not yet established collections, mainly due to the challenges they encounter in acquiring, curating, and exhibiting such objects. These technologies are also objects of interest for archaeolo- gists, who encounter them as part of the material culture of the Anthropo- cene (Beale/Schofield/Austin 2018). For example, a USB stick found in an excavation in London in 2012 was subsequently acquired by the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford (Accession number: 2016.47.1, Moshenska 2014), where it is now on display. A first characteristic of digital objects is that they can emerge as reproduc- tions of existing heritage objects, for example in digitising projects. In this context, also the discussion on simulation as a potential risk in the online circulation of heritage knowledge and values, need to be reframed in rela- tion to digital objects. The discussion on the relation between the ontologi- cal status of a digital object and its physical counterparts has a long history. Many discussions go back to Benjamin, who argued that “even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its pres- ence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be” (Benjamin 2006 [1935]). The lack of this presence, of the “aura” of an object, constitutes a major challenge to its authenticity, and ultimately its authority (Benjamin 2006 [1935]). Much has been written on this topic since Benjamin, also in relation to digital objects. In 2007, Fiona Cameron argued that digital objects could “potentially be seen as objects in their own right” (Cameron 2007, 54), suggesting the possibility that they could de- velop their own aura and agency. Drawing on Benjamin, Latour and Lowe (2010) argued that the aura could actually migrate. Their argument was that good “facsimiles” would allow visitors to experience the work of art in a way that the original might not enable anymore, as in the case of Ve- Can digital objects develop their own “aura” and agency?