Hello MCN members and friends, I'm writing to announce a new consortium project aimed at the problems of collecting, documenting, and preserving digital art, net.art, and other variable media art forms. Details on this project, "Archiving the Avant Garde: Documenting and Preserving Variable Media Art" can be found at: http://www.bampfa.berkeley.edu/ciao/avant_garde.html
A general summary of the project is included below. I'm writing in particular because this project is consortial in nature; and thus includes mechanisms for broad input from artists and other professionals (those on this list for instance). I would also be very curious to hear of other current efforts relating to these same problems that anyone on this list may be engaged in or know about. Thanks for sharing any feedback or information you may have to share; and we hope to engage this community further with this project as it unfolds. --------- ARCHIVING THE AVANT GARDE: DOCUMENTING AND PRESERVING VARIABLE MEDIA ART Works of variable media art, such as performance, installation, conceptual, and digital art, represent some of the most compelling and significant artistic creation of our time. These works are key to understanding contemporary art practice and scholarship, but because of their ephemeral, technical, multimedia, or otherwise variable natures, they also present significant obstacles to accurate documentation, access, and preservation. The works were in many cases created to challenge traditional methods of art description and preservation, but now, lacking such description, they often comprise the more obscure aspects of institutional collections, virtually inaccessible to present day researchers. Without strategies for cataloging and preservation, many of these vital works will eventually be lost to art history. Description of and access to art collections promote new scholarship and artistic production. By developing ways to catalog and preserve these collections, we will both provide current and future generations the opportunity to learn from and be inspired by the works and ensure the perpetuation and accuracy of art historical records. It is to achieve these goals that we are initiating the consortium project Archiving the Avant Garde: Documenting and Preserving Variable Media Art. The collaboration includes of the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAM/PFA), the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Walker Art Center, Rhizome.org, the Franklin Furnace Archive, and the Cleveland Performance Art Festival and Archive. -- - Richard Rinehart --------------- Digital Media Director, Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive www.bampfa.berkeley.edu --------------- Instructor, Department of Art Practice art.berkeley.edu --------------- University of California, Berkeley --- You are currently subscribed to mcn_mcn-l as: [email protected] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [email protected]
