Unfolding Communities: Imaging the Past, Envisioning the Future

This paper describes an ongoing project which is ideological in its vision, anthropological and historical in its research and technological in its application. It outlines a model for cross cultural documentation and analysis of lost communities through a combination of ‘hands on’ and advanced imaging technologies. The rationale underlining the project is that through joint activity, discourse and discovery, widely differing groups can forge a common ground and gain a better understanding of the other. The pilot project outlined here describes a venture involving the participation of students from Israel and Germany in restoring a cemetery of the lost Jewish community of Bad Neustadt in Northern Bavaria. The paper introduces the conceptual background of cemeteries in various cultures. It then presents the case study of the Bad Neustadt project and continues with the various technological and methodological approaches to the application of advanced photographic and imaging technologies in observation, investigation, documentation and dissemination of the content. The paper concludes with the suggestion that this model may act as a template for future cross cultural? collaborations of a technical, academic and social nature.