Research on Revolution: A Preservation Case Study in the Scope of Inside Installations
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Day 1, Group 4Gaby Wijers, Netherlands Media Art Institute (NIMk), AmsterdamThe focus of this case study, within the scope of the Inside Installations project, was to establish what was important for the preservation of Jeffrey Shaw’s computer-based interactive installation and how emulation can be used as a preservation strategy... |
| Gaby Wijers © DOCAM 2008 |
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| ... In this installation, the spectator pushes a bar attached to a steel column with a built-in monitor. Pushing in a forward position, 180 images of historical revolutions are being presented on the monitor. A fast turn will result in a vague blur of images. Pulling backwards, the image of a milestone appears. The technology used is over 15 years old and, within the next 10 years, one of the components of Revolution (an analog rotation sensor, an 8086 XT PC, a Sony DLP1500 laserdisc player and a handmade sample player/interface box) will probably break down beyond repair. Additionally to in-depth documentation, installation instructions and an artist interview, a precise description of hard- and software, function and user interaction was made, the content was secured digitally and many aspects of the behaviour of the installation were measured and described. To test the validity of this description, an emulation process was implemented using Pure Data (Pd). Coordinator of collection, preservation and related research at the Netherlands Media Art Institute (Amsterdam), Gaby Wijers has a background in librarianship, theatre and informatics. She participated in various international projects dealing with the documentation and preservation of media art and coordinated the project Preservation of Video Art in the Netherlands. She also participated in 404 Object not found, the OASIS archive, Inside Installations and is currently the content coordinator for GAMA. Selected publications include: “The Sustainability of Video Art: Preservation of Dutch Video Art Collections”, eds. Gaby Wijers, Evert Rodrigo, Ramon Coelho, Foundation for the Conservation of Modern Art: Amsterdam, 2003; “Control and Preservation of Videotapes: An introduction to the handling, storage and conservation of analogue and digital videotapes”, NL version Cr no. 1, 2002. Since 2005, she edits the online newsletter Monitoring Media Art Preservation with information and news about ongoing research, presentations and publications dealing with video and media art preservation. She is also a guest lecturer at the University of Amsterdam. |