Factum Foundation

Factum Foundation for Digital Technology in Preservation is a not-for-profit organisation, founded in 2009 in Madrid by Adam Lowe. It works alongside its sister company Factum Arte, a multi-disciplinary workshop in Madrid dedicated to digital mediation in contemporary art and the production of facsimiles.

About Us

Our primary goal is to create high-resolution, accurate digital documentation of cultural heritage sites and artworks around the world. This documentation is intended to serve as a record for posterity and to enable the production of indistinguishable facsimiles, especially in cases where the original has been damaged, destroyed, lost, looted or where it is inaccessible to the wider public.

Iconoclastic destruction, mass tourism, war, natural disasters, imperfect restoration and commercial exploitation all pose serious threats to the preservation of many great works of art and culture.

From Egypt’s Valley of the Kings to the mountains of Dagestan, from the Venetian lagoon to the Amazon rainforest, Factum Foundation is working with international agencies, governmental bodies, public and private collections to record and recreate cultural heritage objects and sites; pre-historic caves, Renaissance paintings, tapestries, miniature manuscripts, and monumental tombs. By preserving the past, we seek to empower the present and inspire the future.

Our Mission

Factum Foundation is a world-leading organisation in cultural heritage preservation and technology. It was established in 2009 to demonstrate the importance of documenting, monitoring, studying, recreating and disseminating the world’s cultural heritage through the rigorous development of high-resolution recording and rematerialisation techniques.

High-resolution recording

We use non-contact recording methods to document cultural heritage sites and objects to the highest possible standards.

Factum Foundation exclusively uses non-contact, non-invasive recording methods to document cultural heritage sites and objects. Our reputation lies in the fact that we record at the highest possible resolution.

See our Digitisation projects

New technologies for cultural heritage preservation

We innovate and develop scanners and systems for use with two-dimensional, multi-spectral and three-dimensional applications.

We spearhead the development of new recording and display technologies. Through the development of hardware and software, Factum Foundation promotes an understanding of the mediations and transformations involved in the recording, processing and output of digital data.

See our Technologies

Re-materialisation of cultural heritage

We work to clarify the role of physical facsimiles in conservation, research and the display of art.

We pioneer new techniques to create facsimiles of paintings, sculptures, and cultural sites. These facsimiles are so accurate that the naked eye cannot tell them apart from the original, but they can also do things which originals cannot: allowing fragile objects to travel, fragmented objects to be reassembled, and untouchable objects to be touched. Facsimiles can provide a more natural and deeper engagement with cultural heritage, facilitating a new idea of sustainable tourism in which access is made compatible with preservation.

See our Facsimile and Recreation projects

Training, education, sharing

We establish training and apprenticeship programmes to pass on skills and experience of both hardware and software.

We aim to share recording skills and technologies as widely as possible. By setting up training courses and centres in diverse locations such as Egypt and Dagestan, Venice and Oxford, we seek to create local experts in digital preservation who can record their own cultural heritage. Training projects can take diverse forms, from collaboration with renowned universities to transfer of skills and technology to local operators. Additionally, Factum Foundation’s experts are regularly invited to present our work in lectures and masterclasses, online and worldwide.

See our Trainings

Exhibitions

We design and produce exhibitions that establish originality as a process and not a state of being.

We design, produce and curate exhibitions which allow audiences to understand the dynamic nature of objects, using digital models and physical facsimiles. We aim to challenge the idea that an object in its current state – perhaps restored, damaged, or enhanced over a period of centuries – is the only key to understanding and appreciating it.

See our Exhibitions

Research and new knowledge

We enable new knowledge for research, education, scientific and scholarly uses.

Recording or recreating an object requires a deep intimacy with its surface and can transform the understanding of its history. Many of our projects are motivated by a desire to support researchers and our projects and technology often lead to new discoveries.

See our Research projects

Data ownership and transparency

We promote transparency on data ownership

We ensure that the data we record belongs to the institution or the individual responsible for the object or site, for all current and future applications. Factum Foundation doesn’t own any rights over the data we record. This model benefits the owner or custodian of the object or site.

More on our approach to data ownership on our FAQs

Data archiving

We create practical, secure archiving and display systems for high-resolution data.

We aim to leave to future generations an archive of raw, unmanipulated data which they can analyse according to their own questions and perspectives and using their own technologies, allowing them to inherit the past in a condition in which they can study it in depth and emotionally engage with it.

Explore our High-Resolution Viewers section

New applications for digital conservation and restoration

We use non-invasive methodologies to inform and assist studies, theories and traditional conservation

We develop new techniques of digital conservation and restoration, expanding the range of possibilities open to curators, conservators, archaeologists and other specialists by allowing objects to be restored in the virtual realm.

Changing attitudes towards the digital recording of cultural heritage

We advocate for new approaches and uses of digital information in the recording, display and communication of works of art.

Through training programmes with universities and cultural institutions, conferences, workshops, and institutional collaborations, we play an active role in the international effort to develop shared principles for the digital recording, archiving, and dissemination of cultural heritage. We encourage the creation of permanent and accessible public records of important objects and artworks.

See our Books and Publications

Our Vision

Our vision is to continue to use our technology and expertise to safeguard and promote access to our global cultural heritage, especially that which is at risk.

Walter Benjamin starts his essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (1935) with a quote from Paul Valéry's The Conquest of Ubiquity

“For the last twenty years neither matter nor space nor time has been what it was from time immemorial. We must expect great innovations to transform the entire technique of the arts, thereby affecting artistic invention itself and perhaps even bringing about an amazing change in our very notion of art (Aesthetics, 1928).”

Digital technology is bringing about that 'amazing change', but Valéry's prediction seems almost prophetic if you read what follows that quote in the original text: 

“At first, no doubt, only the reproduction and transmission of works of art will be affected. It will be possible to send anywhere or to re-create anywhere a system of sensations, or more precisely a system of stimuli, provoked by some object or event in any given place. Works of art will acquire a kind of ubiquity. We shall only have to summon them and there they will be, either in their living actuality or restored from the past. They will not merely exist in themselves but will exist wherever someone with a certain apparatus happens to be. A work of art will cease to be anything more than a kind of source or point of origin whose benefit will be available and quite fully so, wherever we wish.”

The Conquest of Ubiquity
Paul Valéry, 1928

We envision a future where the preservation of cultural heritage is revolutionised through the seamless integration of technology, combining disciplines to create innovative solutions that ensure the longevity and accessibility of our global heritage. By harnessing the power of art, science, and technology, we strive to inspire a new era of collaboration and creativity, where the boundaries between preservation, innovation, and interdisciplinary exploration are transcended.

We are dedicated to preserving the past, empowering the present, and inspiring the future through our innovative approaches and collaborations with partners worldwide.

All too often there is a lack of willingness to make funds available for preservation. Historically, Factum has successfully self-funded projects, including the preservation of Tutankhamun's and Seti I's tombs, as well as the recreation of the vandalised sacred cave of Kamukuwaká. As our projects have expanded in scale and number, we increasingly depend on the generosity and financial support from individuals and organisations in order to continue carrying out our work. By becoming a member of our network of supporters, you play a crucial role in actively safeguarding cultural heritage for the benefit of future generations.

Collaborators

Factum Foundation regularly carries out projects and supports the documentation of artworks in institutions such as the British Museum, the Museo del Prado, the V&A, and Fondazione Palazzo Te.

It is running and developing projects in conjunction with Community Jameel, the Bodleian Library and the Royal Commission for AlUla. In collaboration with the Fondazione Giorgio Cini and Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Factum Foundation launched ARCHiVe – Analysis and Recording of Cultural Heritage in Venice – in 2018.

Factum Foundation currently has projects in Egypt, Nigeria, Brazil, Italy, the UK, Spain, Saudi Arabia, France and many other parts of the world. The application of Factum’s model to at-risk zones, sites and artefacts is becoming increasingly significant for the standard of the data generated in terms of high-resolution recording, as well as the cost-effectiveness of its implementation in endangered areas.

Whether you represent a public or private institution, are an independent researcher, or belong to a university, there are various ways to collaborate with Factum Foundation. Feel free to contact us to suggest or inquire about a project.

Private collectors interested in using Factum Foundation's technologies to record their collections can do so through our joint venture Colnaghi & Factum. Click here for more information.

Austria

Kunsthistorisches Museum
mumok – Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien

Belgium

Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten Antwerpen (KSMKA)
La Monnaie de Munt (Bozar)

Brazil

Associação Indígena Kuikuro Alto Xingu
People’s Palace Projects
Spectaculu

Canada

Antimodular Research Inc
Canada Digitization
Think to Thing (Toronto)
Carleton University (Ottawa)

Chad

Ministry of Culture
Ministry of Tourism

Chile

Museo Antropológico Sebastián Englert (Rapa Nui)

China

University of Hong Kong
WorldSkills Museu

Denmark

Aarhus School of Architecture
SMK – National Gallery of Denmark

Egypt

American University in Cairo
Ministry of Antiquities

Tarek Waly Centre
TedX Cairo
United States Embassy in Egypt

EU

European Commission

Finland

Arctic Drone Labs
Alvar Aalto Foundation
City of Jyväskylä
Oamk – Oulu University of Applied Sciences
Tampere University
The Oslo School of Architecture and Design
University of Oulu

France

Ateliers Jean Nouvel
Bibliothèque Nationale de Bordeaux
Centre des Monuments Nationaux
Fondation Cartier
Galerie Didier Claes
Hospices Civils de Beaune
La Conciergerie
Musée Condé du Château de Chantilly
Musée Cluny
Musée des Arts Décoratifs
Musée des Beaux-Arts (Orléans)
Musée du Louvre
Musée Jacquemart-André
Museum of Grenoble 
Musée Quai Branly

Germany

Alte Pinakothek Munich
Leipziger Museums der bildenden Künste (MdbK)
Museum der bildenden Künste

Greece

Benaki Museum
Kaparos Fine Art Foundry
Greek Ministry of Culture

India

Jamia Millia Islamia University

Iraq

Iraqi Embassy in Spain
University of Mosul

Italy

ABI – Associazione Banche Italiane
Aeroporti di Roma
ALES – Arte Lavoro e Servizi (Rome)
Appia Antica Archeological Park 
Autogrill
BALLANDI Multimedia
Basilica di San Petronio (Bologna)
Berengo Studio (Venezia)
Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana (Venice)
Biennale di Venezia
CARISBO
Casa Buonarroti (Florence)
Castello di Gabiano 
Castello Sforzesco (Milan)
Cavina Terra Architetti
Complesso Monumentale della Pilotta (Parma)
Comune di Caravaggio
Comune di Urbino
Convento di Santa Maria delle Grazie e Cenacolo Vinciano
Diocesi di Bologna
FEC – Fondo Edifici di Culto
Fondazione Cassa del Risparmio di Tortona
Fondazione Giorgio Cini
Fondazione Palazzo Te
Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia
Fondazione Prada 
Fondazione Querini Stampalia
Galleria Continua (San Gimignano)
Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica di Palazzo Barberini
Galleria Borghese
Gallerie dell’Accademia (Firenze)
Genus Bononiae. Musei nella città
ISIA Urbino
Italgas – Heritage Lab
IULM Universitá
Mart – Museo d’arte moderna e contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto
Michele de Lucchi
Musei Capitolini
Musei Vaticani
Museo Archeologico Nazionale (Florence)
Museo Canova (Possagno)
Museo Civico Archeologico (Bologna)
Museo Civico di Bassano del Grappa
Museo Palladio (Vicenza)
Museo Correr (Venice)
Museo della Città di Rimini
Oratorio di San Lorenzo (Palermo)
Ordine dei Cavalieri di Malta (Venice)
Palazzo Ducale (Mantua)
Palazzo Grimani (Venice)
Palladio Museum (Vicenza)
Pinacoteca Ambrosiana
Pinacoteca di Brera
Pinacoteca Nazionale (Ferrara)
San Luigi dei Francesi (Rome)
Santa Maria dello Spasimo (Palermo)
Scuderie del Quirinale (Rome)
Sky Arte
The Art Newspaper 
UNIBO – Università di Bologna
Università Ca’ Foscari (Venezia)
Università IUAV di Venezia
Villa Cagnola (Gazzada)

Japan

Tokyo University of the Arts

Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

AFALULA French Agency for AlUla Development
Art Jameel
Athr Gallery
Community Jameel
MISK Foundation
Noor Riyadh Festival of Light
Royal Commission of Al-Ula
Royal Commission for Riyadh City
Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale (Riyadh)

Lebanon

Arab Image Foundation
Association pour la protection des sites et anciennes demeures au Liban (APSAD)
Ministry of Culture

Mexico

Universidad Autónoma de México

Netherlands

Mauritshuis (Den Haag)
Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (Rotterdam)
Museum Catharijneconvent (Utrecht)
Museum de Lakenhal
Leiden University
Rijksmuseum van Oudheden (Leiden)
Rijksmuseum Twenthe
TEFAF 
TU Delft
Utrecht University

Nigeria

EMOWAA (Edo Museum of West African Art)
NCMM (National Commission for Museums and Monuments
Nigeria)
The Trust for African Rock (TARA)
University of Calabar

Norway

Architectural Department of the University of Oslo
Henie Onstad Kunstsenter (Oslo)
Norsk Folkemuseum
Romsdal Museum

Portugal

Faculdade de Engenharia da Universidade do Porto

Russia

Archaeology and Ethnography of the Dagestan Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IHAE DSC RAS)
Peri Foundation
Kala-Koreysh
Institute of History
Monastery of Ferapontov
Museum Sanctuary and Ethnographic Complex Dag-Aul Museum
Tretyakov Gallery

Somaliland

Hargeysa Cultural Centre
Redsea Cultural Foundation

Spain

Alfáreria Tito (Úbeda)
Andalusian Institute of Historical Heritage (IAPH) 
Archivo Histórico Provincial de Sevilla
Archaeological and Ethnological Museum of Córdoba 
Asociación de los Amigos de la Catedral de Tudela
Asociación Española de Museólogos
Ayuntamiento de Arroyo Molinos
Ayuntamiento de Barrado
Ayuntamiento de Priego de Córdoba
Ayuntamiento de Sevilla
Real Alcázar (Sevilla)
Ayuntamiento Toralba de Ribota
Banco Santander
Biblioteca Nacional (Madrid)
Bilbao Fine Arts Museum
Cabildo de Gran Canaria
Cabildo Insular de La Palma
Caixa Forum (Madrid and Valencia)
Calcografía Nacional
Casa de Mesa (Toledo)
Casa de Pilatos (Sevilla)
Casa Natal de Velázquez (Sevilla)
Casa Árabe
Catedral de Mejorada del Campo
Centro de Arte Botín
Patrimonio Nacional
CEEH – Centro de Estudios Europa Hispánica
CITpax – Centro Internacional Toledo para la Paz
Comunidad Valenciana
Conjunto Arqueológico Madinat al-Zahra
Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (and CSIC: Proyecto Djehuty)
Convento Santa Clara la Real (Toledo)
ETSAM – Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura de Madrid
Filmoteca de Andalucía (Córdoba)
Finnish Cultural Institute
Finnish Embassy to Spain
Fundación Amigos Museo del Prado
Fundación Banco Santander
Fundación Casa Ducal de Medinaceli
Fundación Huerta de San Antonio 
Fundación Juan March
Fundación María Cristina Masaveu Peterson
Fundación San Millán de la Cogolla
Fundación Telefónica
Galería Betty Guerreta
Generalitat Valenciana
Hermanas Clarisas Franciscanas
Hermandad de la Santa Caridad
Hermita de San Baudelio de Berlanga
Hospital de la Caridad (Sevilla)
Hospital de Tavera (Toledo)
Instituto Andaluz de Patrimonio Histórico
Instituto Valencia de Don Juan
Junta de Andalucía-Consejería de Cultura y Patrimonio Histórico
LÔAC – Alaior Arte Contemporáneo (Menorca)
Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores
Ministerio de Cultura y Deporte de España
Ministerio de Defensa de España
Municipality of Villastar 
Museo Arqueológico Nacional
Museo Bilbao Bellas Arte
Museo Cerralbo
Museo de Colecciones Reales
Museo del Traje (Madrid)
Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía
Museo Nacional de Escultura (Valladolid)
Museo Nacional del Prado
Museo Naval de Madrid
Museo Sefardí – Sinagoga del Tránsito (Toledo)
Museo Sorolla
Museo Tiflológico de la ONCE
Museu d'Arqueologia de Catalunya
MAC (Barcelona)
Palacio del Capricho
Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando
Real Academia de la Historia
Real Fábrica de Tapices
Real Santuario Insular de Nuestra Señora de las Nieves
Real Armería – Patrimonio Nacional
Spanish Embassy in Iraq
TEDx Madrid
Museo Universidad de Navarra
Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum
Universidad Complutense
Universidad de Castilla la Mancha (UCLM)
Universidad de Granada
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid

Turkey

Gerger Kültür Turizm
Sanat ve Hoşgörü Derneği (GKTSHD)

Switzerland

Antikenmuseum Basel
ARCH – The Alliance to Restore Cultural Heritage in Jerusalem
Art Basel
Carène Foundation
ETH Zurich: Department of Architecture
Michelangelo Foundation
Universitat Basel
Vitromusée Romont
Wilde Gallery

US

Adam Williams Fine Art
amfAR – The Foundation for AIDS Research
American Research Center in Egypt – ARCE
Case Western Reserve University
Chrysler Museum of Art (Norfolk)
Cleveland Museum of Art
Columbia University
Divirod
Gannon University
Google Arts&Culture
Institute of Ecotechnics
Massive Change Network
Menil Collection
Miami Map Fair
MoMA – Museum of Modern Art
Morgan Library
Museum of Fine Arts Boston
National Gallery of Art in Washington
Princeton University
The Frick Collection
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
University of California (Berkeley)
US Institute of Peace

UAE

Al Ain Museum
Department of Culture and Tourism Abu Dhabi
Green Art Gallery
Hay Festival
Juma al Majid Centre for Arts and Heritage (Dubai)
Louvre Abu Dhabi
MEFA – Middle East Falconry Archive
Mohammed Bin Zayed Raptor Conservation Fund

UK

Agnews Gallery 
Art UK
Ashmolean Museum
Bodleian Library
Book Works
British Library
British Museum
Bronze Oak Tree Project
Burgess Studio
C. Hoare & Co
Cambridge University
Colnaghi
Connaught Hotel
Courtauld Institute of Art
Dovecot Studio
Dover District Council
Durham University
Ecotechnics Maritime Limited
English Heritage
Errol Fuller Collection
Glasgow Museum 
Griffiths Institute
Grinling Gibbons Society
Helen Hamlyn Trust
Historic Scotland
Houghton Hall
ICRA – International Catalogue Raisonné Association
JamJar Flowers
Lisson Gallery
Littoral Arts Trust
London Bell Foundry
Made by Many
Mappa Mundi Trust – Hereford
Masterpiece London Art Fair
National Galleries of Scotland
National Gallery (London)
National Trust
October Gallery
Pangolin Foundry
Paragon Contemporary Editions
Photo London
Pitt Rivers Museum
Re-Form Heritage
RH England
Royal Academy of Arts
Royal Collection Trust
Rupert Wace Ancient Art
Scan Lab
Sir John Soane’s Museum
Skene Catling de la Peña
Société Générale UK
Stonewall Equality
Strawberry Hill House
Tern TV
The Bartlett School of Architecture 
 
The Booker Prize Foundation
The Frontline Club
The Rothschild Foundation
The Auckland Project
Tolkien Society
UCL – University College London
United Kingdom Historic Building Preservation Trust
Victoria and Albert Museum
Victoria Miró
Waddesdon Manor
Warburg Institute
Wellington Collection
Whipple Museum of the History of Science
Wilton House

Our Team

Over 50 people work together in a space of 8000 sq meters. Their skills are diverse: 3D scanners, architects, electrical and physical engineers, 3D modelers, sculptors, welders, textile specialists, fine and applied artists all work together. All projects at Factum are collaborative.

FAQ's

What do we mean by the biography of an object? Why is high-resolution recording important for preservation? How do we process the data? Why are we interested in the surface of objects?

Get Involved

With your help, Factum can continue to document and disseminate the world's cultural heritage through newly developed technologies.