AIC's 42nd Annual Meeting

Media art conservation requires many forms of research to implement strategies for long-term preservation. Standard research includes investigating original playback equipment, staying abreast of emerging audio, video, and software technologies, and communicating with artists about technologies they use and their exhibition preferences. Media conservation also requires primary research to develop strategies for new technologies that artists use in their production. Museums are well served by establishing relationships with local universities to conduct some of this research. Academic faculty and students can assist media conservation in many ways, from answering technical questions to engaging in more extensive collaborations.

In this presentation the speakers describe research relationships developed between Media Conservation at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and New York University (NYU). Over the past seven years a number of collaborative projects and courses facilitated needed research for the museum and provided learning opportunities for students in the Courant Institute of Mathematics, the Moving Image Archive Preservation Program, the Museum Studies Program, and the Institute of Fine Arts. One case study will be featured, in which undergraduate Computer Science students from NYU researched and documented software-based works in MoMA’s collection.

Glenn Wharton will describe the research program developed at MoMA that led to these collaborative relationships. He will illustrate the first section of the presentation with examples of collaborative research projects between the university and the museum.

Deena Engel will describe the research conducted by students on software-based art, along with her work to establish the research program within the Courant Institute of Mathematics.