An Interview with Manager of Collections Imaging Rebeccah Swerdlow

Museum of the Bible (MOTB) manages thousands of objects from diverse cultures and eras, including biblical artifacts, manuscripts, books, art, facsimiles, incunables, and Torah Scrolls. Every object requires careful preservation and conservation to ensure its longevity and accessibility for future generations. To accomplish this goal, one of the museum’s key initiatives is digitization, which is the process of turning physical objects into a digital format.

Rebeccah Swerdlow, who serves as the Manager of Collections Imaging at the museum, spearheads this endeavor. As the new digitization intern, I work in the museum’s Digital Imaging Lab and assist in digitally preserving objects the museum acquires or has in the collections. In a conversation with Swerdlow, we discussed her role in the museum and her impact in the cultural preservation space.

The following interview has been edited for clarity and space.

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Tell us about your role at the museum.

In short, I digitize the museum's collections, taking high resolution photographs of museum objects for not only our internal database and records, but also for the sake of research, whether by our curators or by external scholars.

What training or expertise is required?

That's a complicated question. You might think that a lot of people in this field have a background in photography, which can certainly be true, but it's a very new field, and so you have people from lots of different backgrounds.

You also have plenty of people with backgrounds in information technologies. You have people with degrees like mine, which are in history and art history, because it gives you better context. You might also have people who have some sort of museum specialty. And a lot of people actually come with backgrounds in languages. You have a number of people who are incredible linguists because they're some of the few people who can actually understand what they're looking at.

As long as you can gain some sort of experience and working knowledge of photography, you can pretty much come from any walk of life.

What factors are most important when photographing rare or fragile objects?

Where to begin? I think probably the most important factor is the condition of the actual object.

For example, we have multiple editions of the Eliot Indian Bible, which is the first Bible published in America, and is in a Native American language. One of them was in not the worst condition you've ever seen, but the cover was very loosely attached, and it was concerning. We shot it for a little bit. I started to become wary of just how well it was going to shoot because I didn't want any of the equipment to cause any further severance of the cover to the object. I called in the rest of our conservation and collections team to review the object, and we all decided it needed to be repaired before any further digitization happened. Then I moved on to a different edition, but that one was in beautiful condition, and it shot like a dream. I had absolutely no resistance whatsoever. The best thing is just the better condition something is in, the easier it is to shoot.

Why is digitization important to the museum's mission?

I think digitization opens up a whole new door when it comes to accessibility of information, of knowledge, because you can be anyone, from anywhere, of any socioeconomic background, of any level of education, of any culture, of any language, and you can get your hands on all sorts of information, whether that's through search engines, AI, or online learning resources. It's an incredible new frontier for education on a much more public level and on a larger scale.

Digitization is a whole new way of preservation because as much as we value books and paintings and manuscripts and ancient papers and things like that, these things will someday cease to be. Paper and ink eventually start to fade and dissolve, conditions only get worse with time. We have incredible conservators, not just at this museum, but other institutions. But these things are finite. That's just a fact. When you have digital copies, you have permanent copies of things, of objects, in their conditions at various stages.

Digitization is also an incredible tool for internal staff. We're able to detect light damage, air pollutants, or drawings underneath paintings. For the first time in centuries, we now have incredible capabilities with technology to learn all sorts of secrets we never knew.

What advice would you give someone interested in digital preservation or museum technology?

That's such a good question. It's hard to give exact instruction because the field is always changing. I think the most important thing is just always keep learning. Take advantage of opportunities to learn new skills that maybe you don't always see the greatest connection to. If you're a student, take a class where you learn how to code, take a photography class, learn how to use some sort of piece of technology because, frankly, that's one of the best ways to get ahead in the job market.

When it comes to this particular field, yeah, it's great to have some sort of photography or technology background, but don't you sell yourself short if you've got an art history degree—it gets you places.

What inspires you most about your work?

When I was maybe 12 years old, I was reading this historical fiction young-adult novel that took place during the Siege of Leningrad. I remember reading that these characters [were] stressing the importance of protecting Russia’s culture from the impending war. Because if one thing was to survive, it [would be] the culture; that’s how you rebuild civilization. And that moment changed my life forever.

So, for me, the most inspiring thing about my work is being able to better preserve and understand the building blocks of human civilization, including the Bible. Understanding the impact of history and how [it has] continued to shape and propel humanity forward, that’s the most inspiring thing to me when it comes to my work.

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In celebration of Women’s History Month, we are highlighting women whose lives and work have been impacted by the Bible, including our own museum staff, and how their stories impact our own. To see more examples of these women, follow us on social media and learn about their stories and impact.