Museums (generally those wanting to avoid repatriating artefacts in their collections) regularly talk about giving high quality replicas to the original communities that artefacts came from.

This example uses holographic technology – but, as with every time this issue crops up, if it is good enough for the original owners, then why isn’t it good enough for the current owners to keep the digital replica & return the original?

From:
BBC News

Page last updated at 08:03 GMT, Thursday, 6 May 2010 09:03 UK
Hologram artefacts go on display at Llangollen museum

A museum is displaying holographic images of artefacts made using a new imaging technique pioneered in Wales.

The holograms and 3D computer images will be shown at the Llangollen Museum in Denbighshire.
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The British Museum regularly asserts that artefacts are best displayed there. Much of what they do though indicates that like most others, they believe that there is an importance attached to the original context of artefacts. That it is important to show artefacts within the vicinity of where they were found. It’s just that they’d prefer to keep the artefacts for themselves too.

From:
Evening Leader

Holograms to display historic artefacts at North Wales museums
Published Date: 19 June 2009

LLANGOLLEN museum, along with a number of others in North Wales, is to start using holograms to display historic artefacts.
The institutions, along with View Holographics, based in St Asaph, have been successful in securing funding from the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation to create a project, called Bringing the Artefacts Back to the People.

The scheme will use pioneering holographic technology to display works, described as the closest reproduction possible to the real life object and more realistic than photography and computer rendering.
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