Australasian Registrars Conference: Duration and Dimension - Day Two

What do you mean the artwork is no longer approved for exhibition?!

Even though it was a gloriously sunny day, probably better suited to sitting by the river than in a darkened lecture theatre, I was excited to return to Melbourne Museum for day two of Duration and Dimension, the Australasian Registrars Committee’s two-day conference looking at all things digital and time-based. The speakers on day one had been engaging, funny, and generously shared their experiences (both good and bad) of working with time-based media, and day two promised more of the same.

While day one had been full of practical advice on how to manage time-based media, many of the presentations of day two focused on case studies. As a time-based media newbie, this really helped to cement what I’d learned the previous day and demonstrate how these things could be put into practice.

A selection of the case studies will be added to the UKRG website as a separate post, but one of the ones I found most interesting came from Alexandra Nichols at the Met in New York. In 2012, the Met had acquired You the Better by artist Erica Beckman, a single channel video artwork made in 1983. In 2017, the Met contacted the artist, who said the work that had been acquired was out of date and was not approved for exhibition. A registrarial nightmare (and one I’m pretty sure will now feature on the list of things which make me wake up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night). Further discussion with the artist revealed that there were now three versions of the work that were approved for exhibition: a theatre-based presentation (which was how the work was originally presented), a digital projection with strict guidance on how the room should be laid out, and an installation-based presentation. The version the Met had purchased was no longer approved for exhibition as the film had since been remastered. Fortunately, the artist provided the remastered version, but this presents its own challenges, for example, what date should be given on the label text when the work is displayed?

Day two again emphasised the importance of collaboration. As well as registrars and conservators, we heard from an AV manager, a solicitor, and a university lecturer who is also an established artist working with video and installation. The other big takeaway from across both days was don’t be afraid to try. As registrars, we often feel pressure to instantly know all the answers, but the conference emphasised that it is ok to say ‘I don’t know’, to seek advice from others (both internally and externally), and to try different approaches, as long as these are done in collaboration with the artists (or preserving the artist’s intent), and with colleagues, and meticulously documented (obviously!)

The conference closed in the best way – with a presentation of a selection of recently digitised and wonderfully dated adverts from the 70s, 80s, and 90s, thanks to Sarah Davy at Ngā Taonga Sound and Vision.

Overall, the conference was fantastic experience, and one that has left me buzzing with new ideas. I’m hugely grateful to UKRG, and Blackwall Green, for making it possible for me to attend, and would be happy to chat with anyone wanting to hear about anything from the conference in more detail – just drop me an email at ffyles@museumoflondon.org.uk.

Written by Flora Flyes, Assistant Registrar Museum of London, who attended the arcs conference in 2018, Melbourne 3-6th October 2018 after receiving an international bursary from UKRG

This bursary has been made possible by the generosity of Blackwall & Green

Australasian Registrars Conference: Duration and Dimension - Day One

A Head of Conservation, a Digital Systems Manager, an Assistant Curator, and a Time-Based Media Conservator walk into a lecture theatre…  

I feel the need to start this blog with a bit of a confession (or maybe a caveat): I am not technologically minded. Beyond ‘turn it off and on again’, I’m not very good with computers, and I’ve also never worked with time-based media. So, with all this in mind, I was a little bit nervous as I approached day one of ‘Duration and Dimension’, a two-day conference organised by the Australasian Registrars committee looking at all things digital and time-based.

I needn’t have worried. Seb Chan, the keynote speaker, gave an impressive introduction to the wide-ranging digital projects he had worked on (if you haven’t checked out the Cooper Hewett’s Collections Online, where you can browse using a variety of factors, including colour, do it now!). I particularly liked his question ‘If every object was digitised, online, and addressable, how might we train visitors to use the building differently?’ Digitisation for digitisation’s sake is not the right approach – it must have a purpose, and this should be built into any digitisation projects.

All the talks were fascinating, but the one that probably most caught my attention on day one (and resulted in pages and pages of notes) was the presentation from the team at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. One of the key messages of the conference was the need for cross departmental collaboration, and this presentation demonstrated this perfectly. Delivered by the AGNSW Head of Conservation, Digital Systems Manager, Assistant Curator, and Time-based Art Conservator, their presentation gave an in depth look into how the AGNSW had overhauled the way that time-based media collections were thought about and managed, and the resulting policies, documents and processes. Time-based artworks have different considerations to your standard oil painting, and by building these in to the acquisitions process at an early stage, this can relieve pressure when it comes to installation, and offers a great way to build relationships with artists, which can be key when it comes to the long-term preservation of time-based media. Time-based artworks are experiential as well as physical, and the systems that AGNSW put in place help to ensure that this is captured at the point of acquisition. How does the artist view their work, both now and in the future? And what is permitted to change?

Other talks covered the complexities of shipping time based artworks across the world when there isn’t a universal understanding of what constitutes ‘art’, practical considerations for long term preservation of both physical carriers (the VHS tape or memory stick that the work originally came on) and digital files, and great examples of how different institutions manage their information relating to time-based media (I am particularly jealous of SFMOMA’s internal Wikipedia for artworks, which allows them to capture narrative information each time the work is displayed and allows different departments to contribute – a great example of collaboration, and also sharing the burden of documentation!)

Written by Flora Flyes, Assistant Registrar Museum of London, who attended the arcs conference in 2018, Melbourne 3-6th October 2018 after receiving an international bursary from UKRG

This bursary has been made possible by the generosity of Blackwall & Green