Conservation of Contemporary Art?

Last month our Level 2 HAMS group attended a talk at Temple Newsam (@TempleNewsam) addressing the conservation of art in the Leeds Collections. This talk was delivered by Jenny Hack (painting conservator) and Ian Fraser (head of preventive conservation).

Jenny Hack talked of the two modes of coservation: to re-store and to re-touch. I asked Jenny why, if we are so concerned with retaining the objects true authenticity, are Greek sculptures not brightly painted? In response we discussed the boundaries of the conservator. Although it is known that Greek Sculpture was once coloured, due to the lack of documentation 're-touching' them in this way may put us in danger of fabricating the works original appearance. This is being addressed by the use of digital technology, projecting onto works 'what may have been' without physically falsifying the material object.

With this in mind it seems today's art practice may come up against the opposite problem. Different to the Greeks we face no shortage of documentation; mass media (photographing, blogging, tweeting, filming) puts us in the position where such a suggestion would be impossible. Documenting is not only widely practiced, but has become a characteristic of our contemporary culture. However, are we instead in a greater danger of the loss of material object? Art that takes the form of Installation and Perfomance moves away from arts traditional ties, functioning as participatory/conceptual instead of a purely decorative function. But in making these innovations, what aesthetic traditions are being compromised?  

Jenny talked of the difficulty in conserving objects made of degradable materials or involving technologies that become obselete, in place of durable materials such as oil paint. This issue is something that NeCCAR (Network for the Conservation of Contemporary Art Research) have been introduced to resolve. However aside from this issue regarding material, other questions must also be considered. How are we to conserve artworks that are location specific? How are we to conserve artworks that require a certain person or performance to function? When supposing this, it may be justified to state that contemporary art seems to place greater concern on concept over the durability of its aesthetic.

My main thinking when leaving the talk was: will contemporary art remain in museums as the ancient Greek culture continues to exist in ours? Perhaps this is missing the point of what contemporary art is all about. With 'concept' playing such a large role, maybe the physical object and its durability take the back seat. It may be that the artwork of today will exist in the future in-part as material object, but mostly through text and documentation... as projections not of 'what may have been', but 'what was'.

The changing role of the conservator is something I want to look into more, maybe even as a sub-topic in my Dissertation next year. (I am completley new to it so excuse any mis-understandings! Found the talk very interesting though)

Rosa