Joint session with the Early Modern Italian World Seminar We increasingly order the world around us in geo-spatial terms, empowered by mobile devices and geo-location, toggling between 2D maps to 3D street views. The potential of these same technologies for historical research on cities is only starting to be realized. At the same time Augmented Reality (AR) invites a new approach to the ‘museum without walls’, reuniting cultural heritage – cities, buildings, artworks – across time and space.

Drawing from two research projects, Hidden Cities and Florence4D this paper considers how digital art history methods are creating new research opportunities, while at the same opening up new ways to engage the wider public. Spatially-determined research questions encourage us to think about how meaning is constructed from the triad of spaces-objects-people, while spatial technologies (GIS, GPS, 3D modelling) allow us to shape innovative responses to those questions, ranging from interactive map interfaces to locative interpretation delivered on handheld devices. In so doing we’re discovering new things about the material culture of public space in the Renaissance, but also making that research directly available to the public.