404 Object not found_Seoul 2006:
Research Project:
"PPP: From Point to Point or from Production to presentation to preservation
of media art", Hans Dieter Huber
"PPP: From Point to Point or from Production to presentation
to preservation
of media art"
_ Hans Dieter Huber
I am neither an artist nor a curator nor a conservator. My point of view
is that of art history that has evolved from a historical awareness of
the present. Thus I would like to discuss several aspects of production,
presentation and preservation of digital media art in my introductory
lecture.
The term media art, similar to video art or net art, is a most impractical
construction. Nevertheless, colloquially we usually know pretty well what
media art denotes and what is does not. The term generally refers to works
of art that employ technical systems such as projectors, screens, monitors,
control tools or computers. With the transition from the mechanical to
the electronic age, there are now an increasing number of components in
use that are organized on a digital basis or that contain digital intermediate
stages. When I refer to media art in the following, I am intentionally
leaving it open whether these works are produced or presented with the
aid of mechanical, analogue equipment or with electronic, digital systems
or with a combination of both.
What I am concerned with is the development of a conceptual framework
with which we can conceive, explain and understand the relationship between
production, presentation and preservation of media art. Within this framework,
we can distinguish three logical levels: a general, a specific and a historical
one. The general framework attempts to develop an epistemological structure
of the relationship of production, presentation and preservation without
taking special media or historical genres into account. A specific framework
of thought focuses on the different conditions and possibilities of individual
media or media genres. A historical framework of thought, in contrast,
would relativize and scrutinize the different conditions and possibilities
of production, presentation and preservation of media art in terms of
their historical ties, circumstances and contexts. Each of these levels
attempts to contextualize the framework of thought in a different way.
A general theory of media art uses arguments that are in the broadest
sense epistemological and ontological. A specific theory of media art
uses arguments specific to media, while a historical theory, naturally
enough, argues historically.
I
A media art installation is a complex system of individual components
that are connected or that interact with each other. Accordingly, it would
seem useful to distinguish between the organization and the structure
of media art installations. You will be able to see why I think this distinction
makes sense in the following sections on the presentation and preservation
of media art.
What is the fundamental difference between organization and structure?
If you consider a company or authority, for example, this company has
a president, a manager and several heads of department, various departments,
a staff council, a works council, a driver, and a caretaker. These abstract
hierarchies and positions constitute the organization of the particular
company. However, it is equally clear that the aforementioned positions
can be filled by different individuals, who then assume the respective
function within the organization. For example, the manager may be male
or female, old or young, with such-and-such training, and speaking such-and-such
languages. The actual embodiment of a particular organization at a given
point in time and at a given place is the structure of this company. Structure,
is embodied organization.
We can see that the organization of a company or authority is an abstract,
general system that may be embodied in many different ways by actual individuals,
objects or spaces. We can, therefore, refer to the concrete embodiment
of an organization. The same may be observed in works of media art. We
may refer to the abstract organization of a work that may be structured
or embodied by very concrete and different objects, equipment, machinery
or spaces.
As an example, let us consider the video installation by the Finnish
artist Eija-Lisa Ahtila "The House Tale", that was on show last
year at Kunsthaus Z.rich and at the documenta 11.
The specifications regarding structure and presentation are very precise.
A brief paragraph concerning theme and subject matter of the installation
is followed by a short section on structure and form. These parts describe
the intention of the installation. This is followed by specifications
regarding the technical equipment in the form of a darkened room, chairs,
three projection surfaces, the projectors, three DVD players, and a synchronization
unit. For sound, the work needs an amplifier with Dolby Digital 5.1. audio
decoder and 5 - 6 loudspeakers. While the installation instructions explicitly
specify the make and model of DVD player (Pioneer DV 7300 pro DVD), the
type of projector and synchronization unit is only suggested in parentheses.
So in this case different equipment of the same object class could be
used for the installation.
Although the technical instructions for the structure of the work are
relatively precise, many details are not specified. The proportions of
the screens should be 3:4, with a minimum width of 3.5 m. The projection
surfaces should be either of wood or a suitable projection surface. The
lower edge should be 70 cm from the floor. However, the size and material
of the projection surfaces is an unspecified variable that may be varied
to cater for the specific situation. The projectors and play-back units
should be installed above the projection surfaces or suspended from the
ceiling; the instructions note that other solutions are possible.
This organization of the work, prescribed by the artist in her set-up
instructions, may be embodied by different concrete equipment, systems
and rooms. A description of the actual appearance of a work at a particular
time and place therefore creates a description of its concrete embodiment
for a viewer at this place and at this point in time. Hence, media art
installations have two kinds of components: parts that may be replaced
and parts that may not. There are, then, variable parts and invariable
parts for which the same detail or object must be chosen in all cases.
An example of this is the "Shadow Puppet and Instructed Mime"
installation by Bruce Nauman from 1990. This work features three wax heads
made by Bruce Nauman himself that are suspended on a wire from a rod.
These heads may not be substituted by any other wax heads. They must be
these self-same wax heads made by Nauman himself. On the other hand, for
the latest presentation of the work at Kunstmuseum Basel the artist agreed
to replace the original UMatic players by DVD players and the original
3-tube beamers by new units of the same make.
So, to summarize, media art installations may contain components that
may not be replaced by others, and components that may be replaced by
other objects or systems of the same object class. So in this respect
there is a continuum of possibilities and varieties. At the one end of
the scale not a single component of the work may be replaced or changed
without interfering profoundly with the authenticity of the work and its
aesthetic experience. At the other end there are works whose physical
components may be completely changed at any time without affecting the
aesthetic experience of the work in any way. In principle, this includes
all hidden components not visible to the viewer, for example notations,
instructions, concepts, etc. The claim to originality and authenticity
of a work is intrinsically linked to the components of a media art installation
that may not be substituted.
II
Let us now proceed to the presentation of media art installations. Unlike
sculptures, installations have to be re-staged anew every time they are
presented. Because the space is an integral part of the work to be installed,
there are two possibilities. Either the installation is adapted to a given
space or it brings its own space with it. In this case, the space must
be made with the aid of artificial installations that correspond to the
artistOs aesthetic specifications. In any case, however, the specific
setting in which the work is presented will be different for each new
presentation. It will exist at a different time and in a different place
and in a different neighborhood to other works. All these factors impact
on a viewer's aesthetic experience of the work and result in a changed
experience. We are familiar with these shifts of meaning, which are in
fact shifts of context, from our own experience when we see a media art
installation, we are familiar with, again at a later point in time in
a different place. Re-presentation and re-encounter, then, are the decisive
processes in the presentation of media art.
Then there is another aspect, the difference between notation and performance.
Every media art installation consists of a kind of description, installation
instructions or technical manual, the equipment to be used, and the concrete
embodiment of the work in its presentation. A musical analogy lends itself
very well to visualizing this double existence as notation and as performance.
A piece of classical music such as a cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach
consists first of all of a text, representing a notation, that specifies
the manner in which the work is to be performed and played. Only if you
can read and interpret this notation can you perform the work.
Here we can see the first page of the original score of cantata BWV 79
"Gott, der Herr, ist Sonn' und Schild", composed by Johann Sebastian
Bach for Reformation Day 1725 for the service at the Church of St. Thomas
in Leipzig. It has nine or seven bars per line. In the next picture we
can see the same score in the intaglio edition of the catalogue of Bach's
works from 1868. The lines each have five or seven bars. The last picture
shows a current print from 2001 in which each line has four bars. So,
the arrangement of the score itself is different in each of these documents.
The scores themselves also differ.
If the same cantata is subsequently performed at a given time and place
by a certain orchestra and choir, it assumes a visible and audible sensory
presence. The abstract textual notation that represents the organization
of the work is radically translated into a site-specific, sensory embodiment
that is unique and non-repeatable. If we now listen to the two music samples,
we also notice significant differences in mood, the different volume of
the instruments, and the singing of the choir.
This analogy also illustrates the fact that the sound of the Bach cantata
score hinges quite substantially on the specific instrumentation, orchestra,
choir, conductor, and the site at which the cantata is performed and recorded.
Every performance of a score is thus an interpretation of the work. However,
we may not say which one is "the" interpretation of the cantata
but only that there are many different performances. Moreover, it is very
probable that different observers will differ in their judgment of a successful,
beautiful, faithful or daring interpretation of the score.
The same situation may be observed with the presentation of media art
installations. First of all they consist of a more or less precise notation
containing exact instructions for installing the work. In addition, the
notation for a media art installation is not only on paper but consists
of numerous original objects. In the depot it exists only in the form
of its non-replaceable original components. All components that are either
used in the performance on site such as beamers, projects, loudspeakers,
play-back units and control units, along with artificial walls, are not
original parts of the work itself. They belong to their environment and
determine the specific relationship of structural coupling and operational
closure of such a work.
Thus, the abstract organization of a media art work in the form of its
notation or installation instruction also contrasts with a concrete embodiment
in the form of its re-presentation at a particular place and time. A presentation
is always an interpretation of the work. One particular notation may have
many different performances, presentations and interpretations.
This difference between notation and presentation is also found in all
digital media. We cannot tell what kind of document is involved merely
by examining the binary numeric code. What is required is the so-called
meta-code that is stored at the beginning of every binary numeric sequence
and that describes its interpretation. Here again, the specific visible
or audible embodiment of the data depends on the concrete embodiment of
the binary ASCII notation. One and the same binary numeric code may be
interpreted as an image, as a sound or as a text document. The software
- metaphorically speaking- plays the role of the curator, the symphony
orchestra or the actor. Sense and meaning of binary numbers thus depend
on the concrete hardware and software that are used to perform the numeric
notation at a certain place and at a certain time for a certain viewer.
Hardware and software are thus systems of embodiment, performance, presentation
and interpretation. They lend the abstract organization of data a concrete,
physical body that exists at a certain time and a certain place for a
certain viewer. The same is true of the Internet and net.art works. To
be performed or enacted, they also require a certain place at a certain
time and a certain viewer to receive these works in a certain environment.
But let us dwell a while on questions and problems of presenting digital
media art. Also in terms of the hardware components it becomes clear that
every replacement and every substitution of a hardware component will
have an effect on the form, the meaning and the aesthetic experience of
such a work. Perhaps the most important factor to be taken into consideration
is the computer architecture. Clock frequencies, scanning rates and access
speeds are responsible for vast differences in performance. The greatest
differences are achieved by replacing the operating system. Essentially,
Windows, Apple Macintosh and UNIX are the three biggest operating systems
that impact fundamentally on a software's appearance, form and behavior.
In addition there are a wide variety of operating system versions that
result in different appearance, functionality and performance. Specifically
with net-based media art works, e.g. net.art, Internet connectivity is
another crucial factor with regard to the aesthetic experience. It makes
a tremendous difference in terms of aesthetic experience whether you view
an Internet work through a 36 Kbit modem, a DSL link, or a 300Mbit Ethernet
backbone.
III
Let us now consider the preservation of media art installations. There
are many different questions involved here that are not always easy to
answer. Let us then use a number of adverbial qualifications to cautiously
approach the subject. What is to be preserved? Who should preserve it?
How should it be preserved? Why should it be preserved? Where media art
should be preserved? Let's turn to the first question: what should be
preserved of media art? It is obvious that not everything that exists
in the world can be preserved for posterity. So it is necessary to choose
from the manifold reality of media art in order to draw an exemplary picture
of it. The selected objects to be preserved for posterity are not chosen
as material pieces of evidence of reality as it was, but rather as examples,
documents and exponents of certain social and cultural values. Hence,
they do not appear as 'things-in-themselves' in the museum context but
rather as "things for us", as interfaces to recognition and
understanding.
The active selection of works of media art is the first step to preserving
them. From the manifold diversity of reality, those objects should be
chosen that exhibit a cultural value, whose preservation and memory is
in the interest of society. Thus, an active selection is better than a
random, contingent choice. Cultural heritage should be consciously and
selectively appropriated and thus preserved. Precise guidelines for collecting
may be developed for this purpose.
The museolozise media art work as a document of past cultural and societal
values, like every other object in the world, also testifies to itself.
However, this does not suffice as a criterion for collection. What is
more, it represents both the diachronic, historical context from whence
it comes and the synchronous, contemporary context in which it exists
as a museum object of the present. The particular cultural memorial value
of a media art installation thus consists in the ability to document both
the historical and the contemporary reference to reality for society and
to convey it in a vivid manner.
Laszlo Moholy Nagy's Light-Space Modulator is a very interesting example
of this. Moholy Nagy worked on this early example of a kinetic sculpture
for almost ten years, from 1920 to 1930. Originally, the modulator was
to be illuminated by colored theatre spotlights in red, green and blue,
which would have created a tremendous variety of colored, moving shadows.
In 1930 Moholy-Nagy himself summed up his observations with the Light-Space
Modulator in his experimental film "Lichtspiel Schwarz-Weiss-Grau"
(Lightplay: Black/White/Gray). I show you a short part of this film.
In 1970, twenty-four years after his death, his widow Lucia Moholy agreed
to have a replica made. It was exhibited at the Nationalgalerie of Berlin
in 1999/2000 at the exhibition "Das XX. Jahrhundert. Ein Jahrhundert
Kunst in Deutschland" (The twentieth century. A century of art in
Germany). The replica was illuminated by an unsuitable exhibition spotlight
which made the effect very literal and material. The replica could not
enchant the viewer or convey the experience of virtual motion and immaterial
lightplay.
Hence, when actively selecting a media art work the question must be
asked what this work represents, what genre, what typical group or form
of work it stands for and refers to. The museum selection should try to
find typical media art installations. Thus, the collection should comprise
representative examples that could stand for a whole group or particular
type of work, to be preserved for posterity. On the other hand, this is
currently the common clich. of collecting that leads to a situation in
which many collections of contemporary media art all look so similar.
Theoretically, this would provide the opportunity for an active guideline
for collecting atypical, difficult, non-representative works of a group
of works or individual media.
Media art in museums, taken on its own, does not have any social or cultural
meaning. It exists in the museum only as a sign for something. It has
meaning only when attributed by a viewer and only assumes cultural or
social meaning when there is a broad consensus regarding this attribution.
There are always two major influences that determine the social meaning
that media art works attain in the museum context. One is the original
culture or society that authored and produced the primary object meaning.
The other influence is the contemporary culture and society responsible
for placing the work into the museum and re-interpreting it thus. Between
these two poles, the original context of an object and the current context
of interpretation, there spans a wide continuum of possibilities of embodiment,
performance, presentation and interpretation of an art work in the museums
environment.
The collecting institution has the task of documenting, presenting and
preserving the collected works as objects of cultural and social significance.
It is therefore not enough to store or exhibit merely the original components,
objects and materials. Only by means of detailed documentation of the
original context1), by transporting and presenting
the work as an authentic, representative and typical sign of a certain
cultural or social situation, can a contemporary object become a historical,
authentic art work preserved for posterity. For example, when visiting
Gianfranco Baruchello in Rome some years ago, I saw a corked-up glass
bottle from 1965 into which Marcel Duchamp had blown his cigar smoke and
which he then signed and gave to the Italian artist. The mere material
of the empty bottle would not have revealed this history without the reported
documentation.
In the museum context, however, there is yet another functional group
of objects that are neither authentic nor original, but which nevertheless
fulfill an important task: the substitutes. A substitute is an object
that replaces another in a particular usage. The function of substitutes
or substitutions is replacement, use, representation, memory, supplementation
or dissemination. Typical substitutes include the copy, the facsimile,
the reproduction, the cast, the imitation, the reconstruction, the model
or the maquette.
Let us recall the distinction between the organization and the structure
of a media art installation and the statement that such installations
may have substitutable components and non-substitutable original components.
The relationship between replaceable and non-replaceable components is
part of a work's historical authenticity. Compared to the wealth of an
original component, a substitute offers only a very limited repertory
of social and cultural meanings. The reason is that the substitute can
only create a reference to the original context of a work up to, but not
beyond, its own original time. Substitutes, then, actually obstruct any
reference to the original context. This crumbling of reference becomes
all the more problematic, the more components of a work are substituted
over time.
An interesting aspect in this context of preservation and substitution
is the re-reading of a very famous text. It is by Walter Benjamin and
is entitled: "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction".
I am not aware whether this text, much read by artists and art historians,
has also been discussed among restorers. I would like to quote a few passages:
"Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking
in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at
the place where it happens to be. This unique existence of the work of
art determined the history to which it was subject throughout the time
of its existence. This includes the changes which it may have suffered
in physical condition over the years as well as the various changes in
its ownership.... The whole sphere of authenticity is outside technical
- [---] -reproducibility.... The authenticity of a thing is the essence
of all that is transmissible from its beginning, ranging from its substantive
duration to its testimony to the history which it has experienced. Since
the historical testimony rests on the authenticity, the former, too, is
jeopardized by reproduction [---]. And what is really jeopardized when
the historical testimony is affected is the authority of the object."2)
It would be extremely interesting with regard to the problem of production
and re-production expounded here to re-read, interpret, and thus update
Benjamin's essay.
Through the mechanism of museolization, media art installations are detached
from their original exhibition context and transferred to a permanent
institutional context. The link to the original neighborhood in which
a media art installation was first produced and presented is destroyed
by the active selection when transferred into the museum. It is therefore
necessary to record this original context by means of an additional documentation.
The historical importance of things, objects and installations preserved
for posterity in museums not only derives from the fact that they are
stored, but also that they are scientifically documented. Hence, documenting
a work of media art involves recording and reconstructing its past and
present relations.
By dint of its historical importance or its socio-cultural values (i.e.
its representative nature, typicity or authenticity), a museolized media
installation has been taken from an original production and presentation
context. A detailed documentation can therefore often present key parts
of the non-visible information content of a work. For every art work has
an interface at which its visible presence ends and non-visible absences
approach the work in the form of references, knowledge or histories. It
would be a fallacy to think that the cultural, historical or social importance
of media art is limited to the purely visible or aesthetic aspects of
a work.
The question of preserving media art comprises two contrary demands or
wishes. First stands the wish of the conservator to treat the works in
such a way as to preserve them for a theoretically unlimited duration,
and second the wish of the artist or the curator to present the works
of art as often as possible in public. As everyone can see these wishes
are mutually exclusive. They may only be kept in a precarious balance
by means of a compromise that needs to be constantly re-negotiated and
re-agreed. For the demand that media art should be preserved for posteriority
requires the intentional isolation of the original work from its current
environment and, therefore, from the audience and public presentation.
Two extreme points of view are reflected in the conflict between presentation
and preservation, and between curator and conservator. On the one hand
there is the aspect of presentation. Linked to this is the gradual wear,
damage and possible destruction of the original substance. On the other
hand there is the aspect of preservation, with the ideal of preserving
the collected work for all time as an authentic record of its historical
time. In terms of media art, this conflict specifically implies that the
more components of a media installation may be substituted without destroying
the organisation of the work, the more frequently a work may be presented
and subjected to wear. And, paradoxically, it is thereby nevertheless
preserved. The Bach cantata may be performed simultaneously any number
of times, at any number of sites without sustaining any damage, wear or
destruction. While the original manuscript of the score can safely remain
stored in the safe of Berlin State Library.
Here, in this complete separation of a physical original notation and
numerous wear-free performances and interpretations, lies perhaps the
solution to preserving media art. But what would be the price of ceasing
to preserve original materials? Apart from the original score or the original
notation there would be no authentic material but only different, contemporary
versions, performances, embodiments or presentations. Would this idea
really be so unbearable?
References
1) see Alain Depocas: Digitale Konservierung: Die Aufzeichnung der Neukodierung.
Die Strategie der Dokumentation; in: ars Electronica 2001: Takeover. Who's
Doing the Art of Tomorrow? Wien, New York 2001, S.339-345
2) Walter Benjamin: Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter seiner technischen Reproduzierbarkeit.
Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp 1963, p. 13-16 (The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical
Reproduction).
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