Introduction to the Special Issue on Contemporary Art Conservation

The American Institute for Conservation (AIC)’s Contemporary Art Network, or CAN!, aims to embrace and explore the influence by and the influences on the conservator in our daily practice. The articles within this JAIC Special Issue on Contemporary Art Conservation stem from our network’s inaugural sessions at AIC’s 47th Annual Meeting in Connecticut. The May 2019 concurrent general session on “The Evolving Role of the Conservator” and the panel “The Evolving Influence of the Conservator” highlighted changes in the field, particularly when dealing with experimental art, materials, and concepts. We welcomed contributions for this issue that further describe the complex nature of contemporary art conservation, including typical (or atypical, in many cases) challenges they have learned to navigate to extend the expected life of contemporary art – or even investigate the underlying expectations of conservation altogether. This special issue reflects the mission of the newly established Contemporary Art Network, which was formed as part of AIC in 2018/2019 by conservators Luca Ackerman, Kate Moomaw, Giuliana Moretto, Delia Müller-Wüsten, Mareike Opeña, and Martha Singer. We believe discussing the care of contemporary art provides an interesting addition to the American Institute of Conservation, as it is distinct from historic artifacts in several ways. Underlying all forms of contemporary art conservation are intellectual issues, material instabilities, and conceptual complexities – all which have received international attention for the past three decades. CAN! sees the need for providing a platform within AIC for addressing such challenges. We want to explore how contemporary art requires and inspires us to go beyond standard conservation procedures on a practical level, which in turn enables us to rethink these standards and professional guidelines. Contemporary art is typically known for the oftenexperimental character of artwork materials and concepts, or of its rapidly developing new forms beyond sculpture and painting (e.g., time-based media, performance, street art, or internet web art). Unlike most of our cultural heritage, it is the only section that is still growing exponentially. What effect does that have on conservation decisions? Additionally, because it is so vast, it exists outside institutions at least as much as inside museums and established collections. Practicing conservators have long responded to contemporary art’s need of care “outside the museum realm,” as one can see by the flourishing private practice conservation studios in New York City, Los Angeles, Miami, and many metropolitan cities around the globe, where this type of art is commonly produced, exhibited, and marketed. More than half of CAN!’s founding members are from this sector of private practice conservation. CAN! hopes to encourage active participation from conservators in private practice in the future, as it is a vastly underrepresented area of the conservation literature. Most significantly different from historic art is the presence of the living artist, their heirs, or their advocates. This often translates to an individual authority or agency that we must consider and consult with in our conservation decisions – not just morally, but legally. The social or cultural value placement of a particular contemporary artwork is closely tied to the artist’s intention. Therefore, the artist’s opinion has gained significance in conservation decisions to a degree unprecedented in conservation history. This pushes the conservator into situations where subjectivity and contextual considerations become highly influential. Quabeck, Davis, Skopek, and Verbeeck explore these issues in-depth. Another interesting aspect of our youngest cultural heritage is that the common art-historical designation “contemporary art” already spans over a period of six decades, with origins in the 1960s. While there is some tolerance for an aged physical appearance in early contemporary artworks from the 1960s and 1970s, contemporary art is still being exponentially produced. This tension of newness (communicated qua its designated “contemporary” title), struggling with rapidly aging materials yet ongoing production, stipulates a dilemma that contemporary art conservators often find themselves navigating. Barack et al. use in-depth case studies to address how recent theories in contemporary art conservation are being applied to design collections containing electronics and digital components. Moreover, Finn’s case studies explore this dichotomy of contemporary works aging out of repairability – leading to new pathways of conservation theory. It appears the contemporary art era is hesitating to overstep the threshold of becoming historic. There are modern works that expand the definition of contemporary, challenging even the definition of an artwork and its existence in time; Castriota uses a century-long artwork to expand on this point.