INCCA-NA

INCCA-NA’s Artist Interview Workshop: Crystal Sanchez’s Experience

Lauren Shadford — Thu, 06 Jun 2013 13:05:37 +0000

Workshop Participants Interview Each Other Over Lunch

For two days in March, I was one of a few dozen professionals at the INCCA-NA Artist Interview Workshops at the Guggenheim Museum. Down in the basement auditorium, we tackled interview methodologies viewed through an art conservation perspective with workshop instructors Professor Richard Cándida-Smith and SFMOMA Director of Collections & Conservation Jill Sterrett. The approach was to mix the needs of art conservators with general methodologies behind conducting oral histories. Topics included creating rapport with interview subjects, focusing questions, the art of listening, and legal issues. Although the atmosphere was casual, the schedule was intellectually relentless, where breaks and lunches included getting your hands dirty with guided activities.

Glenn Wharton Presenting at the 2013 Artist Interview Workshop at the Guggenheim

Because of all that New York City provides, the workshop was strengthened by its variety of guest speakers. Carol Mancusi-Ungaro, former Menil Collection art conservator and founder of the Artist Documentation Program, provided valuable advice from the things she learned after interviewing and recording countless artists. As a media archivist, I knew about the project through the recent work to preserve and provide access to the video recordings, many of which were on obsolete media, so Mancusi-Ungaro’s talk was a nice full circle moment. Dr. Glenn Wharton, media art conservator at MoMA, outlined his strategy for interviewing artists who work in media based artworks. As artworks with media components are at risk due to their technological dependencies, artist interviews become an essential part of the process to define acceptable parameters of change to the work for future installations.

INCCA-NA Program Committee members Kendra Roth and Rosanna Flouty at Artist Interview Workshop, 2013.

I specialize in media- arranging, describing, prioritizing, and preserving; I also get to work with others in planning for the preservation of media artworks. So, it was great to be in a room filled with art conservators, talking about the need for interviewing artists as part of art conservation methodologies. For media works, discussing the work’s parameters of change- in the face of rapid technological change- is essential.

A great contribution to the workshop came from the Guggenheim itself. In a completely organic and spontaneous discussion, a staff lawyer revealed that the artist interview, one of many conservation resources, is positioned as the authoritative source for the installation and preservation of artworks at the Guggenheim, allowing for some measure of flexibility for the Museum to ethically conserve their artworks according to future needs. This also allows for the artist to change their mind over time in future interviews without having to completely re-negotiate acquisition contracts. This talk, while completely relevant for my work with media, was unplanned and off schedule- reflecting that INCCA-NA’s workshop and leadership allowed for the same kind of flexibility that we, as workshop participants, were taught to approach the interview process itself. Quite poetic.

- Crystal Sanchez is a media archivist/preservationist at the Smithsonian Institution on the Digital Asset Management team (DAMS), working with digital audiovisual collections. As a member of the Smithsonian’s Time-Based Media Art Working Group, she is currently working on a project to interview thought leaders who work to plan for the technological needs of media artworks. Her website post on the workshop is here. [http://artschivista.com/2013/03/13/incca-na-artist-interview-workshop/]

Conservation Interviews: Problematic Assumptions and Unintended Consequences

Lauren Shadford — Thu, 23 May 2013 21:08:13 +0000

As conservators of contemporary art expand their practice to include artist interviews, they have a lot to learn from allied professions with years of experience in qualitative research. Oral historians, anthropologists, and sociologists know the advantages but also the risks involved with the use of interview research. In this brief essay, we formulate some lessons that may inform the relatively new interview practice in conservation. We present them to stimulate critical thinking about this valuable research tool.

Glenn Wharton interviewing artist VALIE EXPORT about a work in MoMA’s collection. Photo Credit: Howard Deitch.

Conservation interviews are unique in many ways. Unlike most scholarly disciplines, their aim is not simply to produce knowledge, but to produce practical knowledge, that is, knowledge that can be operationalized in practice. Conservators, therefore, are more concerned with life trajectories of artworks than life trajectories of the artists who produced them. They are less concerned with social circumstances of production and more concerned with materials and technologies of fabrication.

Interviews can be very useful tools to produce this kind of practical knowledge. Through them, conservators can gain a more direct knowledge about the artist’s intentions and potentially establish clear parameters to decide how to clean and repair an object, how to design an exhibition, or how to display their work to enhance public experience. Yet, as sociologists, anthropologists and historians tell us, interviews are research tools with potentially problematic assumptions and unintended consequences.

A fundamental recognition in humanities and social science textbooks is that interviewing is not a neutral method of information collection. It is a subjective process that is dependent on many variables. One variable is the questions themselves. The questions we ask, and the ones we don’t, as well as how we ask them, shapes the kind of responses and information we obtain. It is for this reason that interviews are better understood as guided conversations. The knowledge we obtain through the interview is always co-produced in the exchange between interviewer and interviewee.

As social scientists and historians remind us, the knowledge produced through the interview process must be analyzed through a critical lens, always taking into account the dialogical nature of this process. Interviewees and interviewers have preset notions and personal agendas when they come to an interview. Conservators’ preset notions include knowledge gained during prior research and experience of the artist’s work. Artists’ preset notions include memories of producing the work and prior experience with conservators and museums. Interviewees are aware that interviews will be used to represent them, so they can deliberately shape their comments to conform to how they want to be perceived. Sociologists describe this as the staging of the self. Interviewers must establish trust in order to move beyond this staging to permit honest discussion about the artwork.

Glenn Wharton Presenting at the 2013 Artist Interview Workshop at the Guggenheim

Another important issue to bear in mind when assessing interviews is that when we ask artists about their intentions and their artistic practices we are never dealing with those intentions or practices themselves, but with accounts of those intentions and practices. And these accounts can be incomplete, distorted or simply wrong. Artists rely on memories that are necessarily selective, and at times incomplete or even mistaken. They may be aided by photographs or the presence of the artwork, but will inevitably be shaped by time and experience since its production. The production of these accounts is affected by different factors. For example, the presence of curators, studio assistants, and others has its own consequences. Artists can stage different selves in front of different audiences. They may be influenced by the potential for future acquisition and exhibition in the presence of a curator, while relationships with people they work with can influence what they remember and how they express their thoughts.

Interview accounts can also be influenced by physical circumstances. An interview in the artist’s studio may be helpful in recovering memories or demonstrating the artist’s techniques and technologies. An interview in a gallery may facilitate discussion about exhibition, whereas conservation tools and materials may aid an interview in the conservator’s studio. In discussion about an upcoming interview with artist Anthony McCall, he asked to be interviewed three times in different settings.[1] Informed by lessons from anthropology, he said that he would inevitably say different things in each interview, thus producing multiple and different accounts of his intentions and practices.

It follows from all the above that the kind of practical knowledge we obtain from interviews is always mediated and dependent on a number of different variables. This, however, does not invalidate the use of the interview in conservation. On the contrary, knowledge of these variables is a necessary precondition to improve the use of interviews in conservation and to be aware of their limitations and unintended consequences. Let’s not work naively, but carry on in this collaborative enterprise.

INCCA-NA was established as a network of professionals that includes artists, curators, conservators and others engaged in the important work of preserving the legacy of today’s artists for the future.

Glenn Wharton

INCCA-NA Board Member

Time-Based Media Conservator, Museum of Modern Art

Clinical Associate Professor, Museum Studies, New York University

Fernando Domínguez Rubio

Assistant Professor, Department of Communication, University of California, San Diego.

[1] In conversation with Glenn Wharton, July 30, 2012.

Gwen Webber joins the INCCA-NA Program Committee

Lauren Shadford — Tue, 14 May 2013 13:05:06 +0000

Our newest Program Committee Member, Gwen Webber, during the March 2013 Artist Interview Workshop at the Guggenheim Museum, New York

We are pleased to welcome our newest addition to the program committee — Gwen Webber. Some of you may know Ms. Webber from her former role as Program Assistant for INCCA-NA when she joined our group in 2011. She comes to us with a BA in Architecture from Nottingham University, UK, and is completing her Master’s in Architectural History and Theory at the Bartlett School of Architecture, London. Ms. Webber is the US Correspondent for Blueprint, a design and architecture magazine in London as well as a freelance writer for a number of other international publications, including The Architect’s Newspaper, New York, and Architectural Review, London. Ms. Webber not only brings on-the-ground familiarity with INCCA-NA’s programs and mission, but also a unique perspective that will positively inform our programming. We are certain we will all benefit from the enthusiasm and energy that she brings.

-Kendra Roth, Chair, INCCA-NA Program Committee

Interviewing Artists: Rose Cull’s Post-Workshop Experience

Lauren Shadford — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 14:00:41 +0000

Blog Post by: Rose Cull, Kress Fellow in Sculpture Conservation, Tate Gallery

I love working with artists. One reason why I work on contemporary art. I like learning more about the creative process and seeing how an artist approaches their work, what they think of it, and hopefully over the course of my career, I will be able to build relationships so I will be able to document the ways an artist views will change over time.

Interview exercise at the INCCA-NA Artist Interview Workshop, April 2012

Almost a year ago I attended the INCCA-NA Artist Interview Methodology Workshop in Washington, D.C. It was a great workshop for many reasons. It put me in contact with numerous stakeholders working with contemporary artists and it taught me skills for effectively interviewing artists. I had a chance to use those skills yesterday when I consulted with Julianne Swartz about one of her pieces which will be traveling from an exhibit at the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum to the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art.

I felt nervous meeting the artist (who wouldn’t?), and I felt like I needed to impress her, I wanted her to like me, I thought, “Are you 14? This isn’t high school. Get a grip Rose, you’re working here. “ I managed to relax and remember my training at the workshop, I let the artist lead the conversation, I spoke about the things I know about, and I learned a lot. Pat Evans, the registrar at SMoCA attended the INCCA-NA workshop in San Francisco and it was great to work with her because we both knew to let the artist talk and not to try to impress her (Pat probably already knew this, perhaps I am the only painfully immature professional when I am speaking to someone famous)

The artist was really positive about the conservation work I had done, told me she thought the piece looked great, which felt fantastic. It is so rare to have that type of affirmation of my work I feel like I will be walking on clouds for the next month.

Emerging Conservation Professionals take a closer look at Tony Smith’s Playground 3/3

Lauren Shadford — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 19:12:00 +0000

Blog Post by:

Lily Doan, Andrew W. Mellon Fellow in Objects Conservation at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and Jacinta Johnson, pre-program intern at Balboa Art Conservation Center. Both are Emerging Conservation Professionals Network (ECPN) co-liaisons for Southern California.

ECPN members basking in the LA sun in front of Tony Smith’s Playground 3/3, which is located in Beverly Gardens Park, Beverly Hills, CA. From left to right: Lily Doan, Carolyn Roberts, Jacinta Johnson, Eloise Owens, and Jacklyn Chi.

In August of 2012, INCCA-NA launched their Artist Research Project, for which Tony Smith was selected as the inaugural artist. Following INCCA-NA’s call to the international community for contributions, Lily Doan and Jacinta Johnson, co-liaisons for the Southern California region of the Emerging Conservation Professionals Network (ECPN), identified that Playground 3/3, a Tony Smith sculpture located at Beverly Gardens Park in Beverly Hills, CA required documentation and research.

A date was chosen to visit the sculpture, and a good mix of both pre-program and professional conservators volunteered their time and resources to examine Playground 3/3. In addition to Lily and Jacinta, the volunteers included Jacklyn Chi, pre-program intern at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Eloise Owens, pre-program student, and Carolyn Roberts, Graduate Intern in Antiquities Conservation at the J. Paul Getty Museum.

Jacklyn Chi conducting photo-documentation of Tony Smith’s Playground 3/3 in Beverly Hills, CA.

The group was organized into two teams – one team tackled photo-documentation while the other took notes on condition. A digital SLR camera was used to capture images in raw format, which were later processed and color corrected to create high-quality images of all accessible angles of the sculpture. For documentation of condition, a point-and-shoot digital camera took quick snapshots of the sculpture, which were immediately uploaded to an iPad. A quick lesson was given to the group on graphic documentation of condition using ArtStudio, an iPad application that “enables users to quickly sketch over digital photos,” taught Lily, who had experience working with the program at LACMA. Graphic documentation was annotated with a color-coded legend and correlated with written notes.

Eloise Owens is using her iPad to document the condition of Playground 3/3 by Tony Smith in Beverly Hills, CA

In the weeks to follow, all photos and condition notes were compiled into one shared folder using DropBox. The team has been busy researching Playground 3/3 and a draft of the wiki article is underway. The City of Beverly Hills is in support of the project, and correspondence with a representative from the City will hopefully produce information on the history of the sculpture, as well as previous preservation measures. Once the article is complete, we will post it on Wikipedia, so stay tuned for the future announcement!

As young conservators, we were happy to contribute our time and skills to the Artist Research Project, and hope that our efforts will play a role in the long-term preservation of Tony Smith’s sculptures.

**Read the finished Wikipedia article on Tony Smith’s Playground (3/3)

Steven O’Banion joins INCCA-NA Program Committee

Lauren Shadford — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 17:01:04 +0000

We are pleased to welcome Steven O’Banion as the newest addition to the INCCA-NA Program Committee. Currently, Steven is a Smithsonian Conservation Fellow at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, implementing a museum-wide artist interview program. He is a recent graduate of the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation where he focused on the issues surrounding the preservation of contemporary art. Previously, Steven has served as a conservation intern in the laboratories of the Museum of Modern Art, The New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and the Tate. He has a passion for public engagement, which has led him to give public lectures to create awareness for the need of proper storage for plastics, speak at schools in the UK about conservation as a possible career path, and maintain a popular blog about conservation. We are eager to have Steven begin contributing to our Program Committee.

Gwynne Ryan, Scupture Conservator, Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden

Board Member, INCCA-NA

Artist Research Project: Tony Smith Roundtable

Lauren Shadford — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 23:19:17 +0000

Tony Smith’s Smug at Glenstone in Potomac, MD

On September 27^th and 28^th, the second component of The Artist Research Project: Tony Smith was launched when a select group of experts from around the country gathered in Washington D.C. to discuss specific conservation issues related to Tony Smith’s outdoor painted sculpture. The group of 15 included a representative of the artist’s estate, an art historian, a collector, a paint scientist, a conservation scientist, metal fabricators, and conservators. We began the first day with looking at several sculptures on the mall, including Throwback, Moondog and Wandering Rocks – three sculptures that have been treated — and ending with Smug, an enormous sculpture located at Glenstone, in Potomac, MD that is in need of conservation. It was incredibly useful to see them in their different environments and how they interacted with the surrounding landscape of plants, buildings, other sculptures, and were received by people.

These sculptures were chosen to be particular case studies that were used to generate focused discussion at a roundtable the following day. That day began by putting the works into historical context with a short lecture, viewing several videos documenting the fabrication and siting of several of Smith’s works along with a documented interview with Smith. This was followed by a lively discussion surrounding the history and past treatments of the works. Topics ranged from technical (gloss levels) to the practical (application methods). There was also discussion of ongoing research on developing paint systems and other research needs. This was all weighed against the preferences of the artist and how he might define a successful treatment.

The meeting ended by a presentation of the crowd-sourcing component of the project already underway, as well as examples of artist-centered web platforms for sharing information. We wrapped up the day having a sense of direction for how Smug can best be conserved and for moving toward creating a collaborative conservation resource.

To learn more about the Artist Research Project, click here.

To learn more about the Tony Smith Wiki Project, click here.

Kendra Roth

Objects Conservator, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Program Committee Chair, INCCA-NA

The Power of Public Space Symposium in Louisville

Lauren Shadford — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 22:46:09 +0000

Tony Smith’s Gracehoper in Louisville, Kentucky

On September 14th and 15th, 2012, INCCA-NA co-hosted in The Power of Public Space, a two-day symposium in Louisville. Working closely with the Louisville Commission on Public Art and the Speed Art Museum, INCCA-NA organized a panel discussion focused on “The Importance of the Artist’s Voice”. Our session was primarily devoted to Gracehoper, a large scale and significant sculpture by Tony Smith, currently located in Louisville’s Waterfront Park. Originally commissioned for the plaza of the Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts in downtown, the sculpture was relocated several years ago to a more open and pastoral site along the Ohio River. While crowded and active during many events throughout the year, the site is secluded many days and most evenings, and the sculpture has succumbed to numerous instances of graffiti and damage and subsequently several campaigns of re-painting. Difficult to monitor and protect, how does the artist’s voice come through in a situation where the work is imperiled? Our panel included Charles Venable, the director the Speed Art Museum, Stephen Klein, the president of the Kentucky Performing Arts Center, Marlene Grissom, director of special projects for the Waterfront Development Corporation, Joan Pachner, independent art historian and Tony Smith scholar, Kendra Roth, conservator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Richard McCoy, conservator of objects and variable art at the Indianapolis Art Museum. Tasked with moderating this session, I think we were able to provide a tremendous opportunity to delve into many difficult issues. Pachner provided a context for the discussion, sharing examples of Smith’s writing and lifetime installation of his work, Klein and Grissom presented the history of the piece and how venue changes had contributed to changes in the object, and Roth and McCoy addressed condition issues and strategies for maintenance. Serious decisions about the future of Gracehoper remain, however new connections and resources were revealed and we were pleased to have been a part of the conversation.

Jay Krueger

Senior Conservator of Modern Paintings, National Gallery of Art

Board Member, INCCA-NA

Rosanna Flouty Joins INCCA-NA Program Committee

Lauren Shadford — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 04:10:42 +0000

We are excited to welcome Rosanna Flouty as our newest member of the INCCA-NA Program Committee. Director of Education at Art21, Ms. Flouty has been involved in developing and investing in site-specific technology to support museum and arts-based programming, both at the ICA Boston and also the Guggenheim, New York. Ms. Flouty directs an important aspect of Art21’s effort to reach wide audiences and educate by chronicling contemporary art. Her experience in contemporary art museum education puts her in a fantastic position to advise and help shape our programming. This, and her ongoing work on Interactive Technology and Pedagogy as part of her doctorate in Urban Education, will be a great asset to the INCCA-NA team. We are truly looking forward to having Ms. Flouty on our Program Committee.

The Power of Public Art: INCCA-NA Partners with COPA and the Speed Art Museum to Address the Conservation of Public Art

Lauren Shadford — Fri, 31 Aug 2012 20:13:39 +0000

Tony Smith, Gracehoper (1961). Gift of the Humana Foundation in appreciation of Wendell Cherry’s leadership as first Chairman of the Board of the Kentucky Center for the Arts. On loan to the Waterfront development Corporation, Louisville. Photo by: Aura Ulm-Scene World Imaging – Louisville, Kentucky.

It has been a great year for contemporary art conservation and it’s about to get even better. This September, Louisville’s Commission on Public Art (COPA) and the Speed Museum of Art will join forces with INCCA-NA to create the Power of Public Space, a two-day symposium with conservators, artists and the public at large. Free and open to all, the event will focus on the most pertinent issues surrounding art in public spaces, such as the maintenance and conservation of artworks; notions of identity and sense of place through public art acquisitions, and the role cities play in the provision and care of publicly accessible cultural artifacts.

Alongside leading conservation experts from some of the most significant institutions in North America, including our Board member Jay Krueger as well as Committee members Kendra Roth and Richard McCoy, participants also include Kim Spence, Curator of Collection Research and Special Projects at the Speed Art Museum, Marlene Grissom, Director of Special Projects at the Waterfront Development Corporation in Louisville and Joan Pachner, Art Historian and Tony Smith Scholar. The symposium opens on Friday, September 14, 2012, with Stewards of Cultural History: How to Evaluate and Refine Louisville’s Public Art Collection, in which a moderated multi-disciplinary panel will discuss the identity and character of Louisville’s public art collection. On Saturday, September 15, we will host a workshop with the Speed Art Museum called The Importance of the Artist’s Voice, gathering conservators, arts professionals and stewards of public artworks to discuss the care and maintenance of these works with a focus on Tony Smith’s The Gracehoper, sited at Waterfront Park.

It is set to be a fantastic event – we hope to see you there!

For a full program, please visit, http://www.louisvilleky.gov/economicdevelopment/CommissiononPublicArt/EducationandOutreach.htm

For information from the Speed on the Saturday panel: http://www.speedmuseum.org/calendar/International_Art_Conservation_Conference

Our exceptional partners in this program: