Contemporary art and archive: how does one make a Public Archive public?

• Grant number: 13/08130-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Start date: August 01, 2013
• End date: March 31, 2017
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Architecture and Town Planning
• Principal Investigator: Giselle Beiguelman
• Grantee: Ana Mattos Porto Pato
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Arquitetura e Urbanismo (FAU). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

There is a lack of procedures to transcribe, translate, and save contemporary art documents in digital archives. The urgent need to manage the documentation generated in the exhibitions of contemporary art has stepped up the theoretical and artistic research around the art archive. Although abundant, the archivist compulsion is still deficient when it comes to the description and sistematization of procedures performed by cultural institutions and museums to preserve contemporary art. On the other hand, artists have turned to the archives of museums seeking for new ways to tell history. It is observed the recurrence increasingly frequent of ephemeral works, created from digital processes, such as video, photography, internet, or even time-based projects, designed and assembled as dynamic systems that connects audio, video and objects. Moreover, the need to preserve these works resulted in the establishment of small collections, created outside of museum institutions, like the archives of festivals and institutions, such as the Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI), the Netherlands Media Art Institute and the Videobrasil Collection, among others. Therefore, by examining artistic and institutional practices related to the archive this research intends to rethink the art archive that has as its central problem, nowadays, defining itself in the virtual space. We understand that this is an important path to ponder about the museum's future.

Academic Publications

(References retrieved automatically from State of São Paulo Research Institutions)

PATO, Ana Mattos Porto. Contemporary Art and Archive: how to make public the archive public?. 2017. Doctoral Thesis - Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Arquitetura e Urbanismo (FAU/SBI) São Paulo.