UNDERSTANDING MEDIUM:  preserving content and context in variable media art
Caitlin Jones
05/20/05

THE MEDIUM AND THE MESSAGE
Marshall McLuhan’s “the medium is the message” is perhaps one of the most popularly quoted phrases of the electronic age. Without entering into the extensive debate still enduring around McLuhan’s logic or his definition of medium as “any extension of ourselves,” (1) the assertion that it is the media themselves not the content that media carries, which should be the focus of study is undeniably compelling.  Regardless, I borrow this heavily loaded quote as a means to illustrate one of the key issues for the preservation of media art -- the complex relationship between an artwork’s material structure and its meaning. From McLuhan’s equivocal medium = message emerges the need for a more nuanced understanding of these terms, and their significance to each other in a time when hardware and software become obsolete at a startling rate.  If we do not place enough importance on the original medium, we will lose important technological information and context for the work in the future. Too much reverence to the original medium, and we risk compromising the intended meaning altogether.

The initial purpose of the Variable Media Network (2) was to come up with a new vocabulary that would allow artists to talk about their works independent of medium, and to envision what their work might look like once it is no longer viable in its current form.  Emerging from a discussion between artists, curators, conservators, and technicians at the Guggenheim was the notion that art works should be described not only by their physical parts, but also by their behaviors.  By talking about the way an artwork behaves we are hoping to gather information from artists as a means to preserve not just an object, but an authentic experience of the artwork.  These artists have chosen to work in mediums that are somewhat disposed to change, and we as custodians must draw on artist’s creativity and vision, in combination with thoughtful conservation practice, to help preserve the original intention once the current form is no longer viable.

VARIABLE MEDIA BEHAVIORS
The behaviors as defined by the Variable Media Initiative are not permanent or fixed, but they give us guidelines for discussing the more ephemeral qualities of a work of art.  To say that an artwork must be installed implies that its physical installation is more complex than simply hanging it on a nail. Are its dimensions fixed? Should it occupy the space alone?  These questions cannot simply be recorded by a set dimension or simply “dimensions variable” in a collections management system.  Does the work have a performative element - not simply in the traditional notion of dance, music, theatre and performance art, but also for a work in which the process of creation is as important as the product?  A medium is reproduced if any copy of the original master of the artwork results in a loss of quality.  Such media include analog photography, film, audio and video.  Alternately, if a work is duplicated it is implied that a copy could not be distinguished from the original by an independent observer - applying not only to artifacts that can be perfectly cloned, as in digital media, but also to artifacts comprising readymade, industrially fabricated, or mass produced components including computer hardware and playback devises.  As a simple example, a description of an artwork could include, “one Sony three-lense video projector” in its medium line. This is useful information to have, but it is not enough on its own.  For future decision-making, conservators and curators need to know why that projector was used.  Was it because it was the cheapest and best at the time?  Was it because it was the brightest?  Was it so the artist could manipulate the three beams of light separately?  Was it because the artist liked the physical look of the machine and how it fit into the overall look and feel of the installation?  These are the questions that establish the relationship between medium and meaning.

Other behaviors are interactive, encoded and networked.  Interactivity describes installations that allow visitors to manipulate or take home components of a physical artwork. To say that a work is encoded implies that part or all of it is written in computer code or some other language that requires interpretation (eg. dance notation or, by extension, a musical score).  A networked artwork is designed to be viewed on an electronic communication system whether a Local Area Network or the internet. It could also, however, be applied to a piece of mail art.  Lastly, even paintings and sculptures can provoke prickly questions when some aspect of their construction alters or requires an intervention.  Such works are contained within their materials or a protective framework that encloses or supports the artistic material to be viewed. Most contemporary art practice is a combination of two or more of these behaviors. Examination of these, in combination with careful notation of the physical components and their function will lead to a suitable strategy for preservation. (3)

FRAMING THE MEDIUM
During a recent trip to a New York area museum I noticed a small didactic panel in one of the galleries.  The panel referred to the Museum’s active acquisition of ‘period frames’ for works in their European painting collection.  Many museums have replaced original frames of paintings – often due to irreparable damage to original frames. Certain modernist tendencies in the 1960s, however, saw the replacement of more elaborate frames with simple L-frames for aesthetic and philosophical reasons.  A move back to period frames as a means to provide a more authentic experience of the work now merits some serious consideration.  What was deemed an acceptable practice in the 1960s and earlier, has in the decades since proved to be a contentious issue for scholars and museums.  Earlier attempts to make the physical supports of a painting a-historical and neutral, has given way to a now pressing preoccupation with context and originality.  It certainly would be interesting to know what kind of frame Cezanne preferred for his landscapes – if he had any opinion at all, but is our experience of his work heightened or lessened by the frame the work sits in?  The contained attributes may be different, but ultimately the painting remains the same.  The parallel between this and the contextualization of new media art is striking.

If we extend the frame metaphor to any structure that holds the content of an artwork, a brilliant example is Nam June Paik’s seminal 1973 video work Global Groove.  Global Groove expresses a palpable excitement about video’s distribution potential accessibility.  It is a meditation on the promise of new video technology and public broadcasting to change the world.  Music and imagery, both borrowed and created, are mixed and manipulated with the Paik-Abe Video Synthesizer (a synthesizer that allowed the artists to experiment with chroma-keying, mixing, colorizing and distortion techniques) to create an homage to the utopian future of the medium.  If the image is bright, if the audio is loud, Global Groove can be installed in copious ways.  It can be displayed on a monitor, projected on a screen, broadcast on public television, and is now even available for a NOKIA mobile phone display. (4) The frame is irrelevant.  The work is not about how it is seen, but simply that it is seen – reproduced in as many places, as openly as possible – in all its mutable and utopian glory.  Without doubt the original technological context and constraints are vital aspects to document.  The Paik-Abe Video Synthesizer on which the work was created is enormously relevant to the understanding of the work, and the whole of video art in the 70s and 80s.  But given the spirit of the work’s message, to keep it in its 1973 iteration -- eternally locked in its original CRT monitor, the work would loose its crucial message.

MTAA’s work 5 Small Videos About Interruption and Disappearing is a series of five short video pieces originally conceived for distribution over the internet at the artist’s site www.mteww.com. “[I]ntrigued by the repetitive gestures and everyday actions in early video artworks,” (5) the artists T.Whid and M.River convey never ending small talk (Blank Conversation), irritating nap interruptions (Lights On, Lights Off), the aggravation of the typing error (Delete), and the low-resolution / high-resolution issues inherent in viewing images on the web (Sliding Compression).  There now exists a local version of 5 Small Videos, which is completely independent of its original networked platform.  In a recent interview with the artists at their studio, T.Whid noted that although the internet is important medium for distribution and access, the frame of the networked environment is not always preferable because with a “browser window, operating system, hardware - you end up with all these layers around your work.”  When discussing the implications of removing the work from one of its original behavioral contexts, networked – the artist stated, “it doesn’t really need to be on the web – it doesn’t really have anything to do with the web.  Just with being interactive.”  5 Short Films has a succinct list of encoded and networked attributes and minimum requirements for viewing the internet version, “5 or later Browser, Flash 6 player, min 800 x 600 monitor.” This answers the very important what of 5 Videos, but asking why gets to the most salient feature of the work – its interactive behavior.

The relationship between medium and message plays out clearly in the work of artist Cory Arcangel.  Arcangel and his collaborators, the programming ensemble BEIGE, create works by altering old Nintendo Entertainment System cartridges.  The work Super Mario Clouds (2002) is a hack of the iconic NES game “Super Mario Brothers.”  Physically breaking into the ubiquitous grey plastic game cartridge, Arcangel alters the program code and removes all action from the game but for the slowly moving clouds.  Projected onto the wall, the piece although firmly grounded in a socio-technological context (if the 1980s rec room counts as socio-technological context), has a natural and meditative quality.  When asked if he would consider showing a similar piece on an emulator (a computer program which allows one to virtually run and old computer and its programs on a contemporary machine) the artist replied negatively, “because the public doesn’t necessarily understand an emulator.  The reason I make works based on game consoles is that all you have to do is see the cartridge to understand what happened… In 30 years a laptop running that game is going to mean nothing to the public.” (6) Although the work was created with the use of an emulator, to display it as such would remove the work too far from its original context.  The familiar blue background and the stuttered movement of the clouds, in combination with the visual cue of the altered hardware, allows for a clear understanding how the work was made.  The artist is unambiguous on the point that it is not a nostalgic connection to the medium, its particular installation is a way for a general gallery audience to understand the process, which is integral to an understanding of the work.

CONSERVING MEDIUM AND MESSAGE
Conservators, curators and technicians worldwide are exploring numerous paths through the field of media art and media art preservation.  Different institutions have different policies and procedures in regards to how works are stored, migrated, emulated or reinterpreted, and who it is that gets to make those decisions. (7) Further questions arise from an examination of the relationship between medium and meaning.  What is the role of the custodian? How tied must we be to the historic value of the medium? Can we make upgrades or changes to a work of art – even if the artist says it’s ok?  What is the relationship between a work and its documentation? (8)  Using the Variable Media paradigm as a guideline has helped to deal with materials in the Guggenheim’s own collection, and provides a means to analyze the integral connections between medium and message.  This analysis helps conservators and curators make informed decisions whether talking about replacing the frame of a painting, migrating a 16mm film to DVD, or emulating a Nintendo on a contemporary PC.  The deeper we delve into new case studies and a wider variety of materials the reductive ‘medium equals message’ equation fails to completely articulate the fast paced and ever changing dynamics. 

(1) Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media:  The Extensions of Man, MIT Press, 1994 (1964) pg 7.

(2) The Variable Media Network is an interdisciplinary group of North American Organizations.  Spearheaded by The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York and the Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science and Technology in Montreal, the Network also includes, Franklin Furnace (New York, NY), Performance Art Festival and Archive (Cleveland, OH)  Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive (Berkeley, CA), and Rhizome.org (New York, NY).

(3) A more complete discussion of the behaviors and strategies can be found in Permanence Through Change The Variable Media Approach.  Alain Depocas, Jon Ippolito and Caitlin Jones Eds.  Montreal: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science and Technology.  2003.  Also available in PDF format at www.variablemedia.net.

(4) Global Groove and other works by Paik, as well as by artist’s such as Brian Alfred, David Salle and William Wegman, are part of Nokia’s “Connect to Art” program.  More information can be found at www.nokia.com/art

(5) www.mteww.com/five_small_videos

(6) Cory Arcangel, didactic material for Seeing Double: Emulation in Theory and Practice.  Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Seeing Double and the related symposium Echoes of Art, addressed through a series of case studies, the potential of emulation for the preservation of new media art.  Information available at www.variablemedia.net 

(7) The New Art Trust, a combined research project between TATE, MoMA and SFMOMA have recently released a very useful “how-to” guide for the loan and installation of time-based media works.  The detailed schematics and checklists are available at http://www.tate.org.uk/research/tateresearch/majorprojects/mediamatters/

(8) Two organizations doing considerable work on the relationship between an artwork and its documentation are The Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art Science and Technology (www.fondation-langlois.org), and V2_: Institute for the Unstable Media (www.v2.nl).