Tuesdays, 6-10 PM,
room 651, Fall 2004
Instructors: Howard
Besser & Ann Harris
Introduction to Moving Image
Archiving
& Preservation H72.1800
Oct 12 Collections Management: Issues and Approaches (AH, HB)
see entire
syllabus
Assignments due before class:
- Read:
- Position
Paper On Conservation & Preservation In Collecting Institutions
- Whitson, Helene and Gerry
Yeager, "Arrangement
and Description" in Steven Davidson and Gregory Lukow, The
Administration
of Television Newsfilm and Videotape Collections: A Curatorial Manual,
Los Angeles: American Film Institute (1997), p. 127 - 148.
- Annette Melville, ed., "Film
Handling", The Film Preservation Guide, San
Francisco:
The Film Preservation Foundation, 2004, pp 19-33.
- Newborg, Gerald G., "A Case
Study: Newsfilm
Preservation Project at The State Historical Society of North Dakota"
in
Steven Davidson and Gregory Lukow, The Administration of Television
Newsfilm and Videotape Collections: A Curatorial Manual, Los
Angeles:
American Film Institute (1997), p. 59 - 68.
Topics covered:
- Appraisal, selection,
description, sorting,
organizing
- Continue with Risk
Management
discussion
- Intro to cataloging and
value
of description
(EAD, MARC, DBs, ...)
- Film Inspection
- Examining uncataloged
boxes of
media and
filling out Bobst cataloging templates (moved to next
week's
class)
- What is the impact of
appraisal and
selection (or the lack thereof) on what gets preserved?
- What are practices for
tracking information
about moving images?
- What are other typical
tasks in collection
management of archival collections?
- How might they differ
for
moving image/sound
materials and other materials such as paper or photographs?
Agenda:
- Handout of Orphans Assignment
- Discussion of final projects (30
min)
- Why do we collect? (60 min)
- Extensive
questions to ponder
- Issues of evidence and
authenticity
- Issues of representation
- Who collects what? for
whom? and why?
How do collections define their collectors? How have museums
influenced
colonialism, nationalism, and taxonomies (categories) of
knowledge?
What kinds of interdependence exists between institutions of collecting
and certain methodological goals of art history and anthropology?
How can we learn to read exhibits critically? What is a
ërhetoricí
or ëpoeticsí of display? Why do people keep personal
collections of objects? How do ethnicities and genders appear--or
disappear--in museum contexts? How do museums also function to
support
a local community memory and history? How do artists view museums
as social institutions? How can we imagine collecting practices
and
museums in the future? How can the history of collecting be read as an
interdisciplinary intellectual practice?
- Why do we need
museums? What
should they look like? Why do we collect things? What kinds of
museums
and collections might we have in the future? What role
might
electronic media play in the rethinking of the museum?
Would
changes in museum practice necessitate changes in the disciplines
of art history and anthropology?
- How are moving images
and
sound part
of the larger visual culture and ways of looking and seeing? How does
our
understanding of visual culture impact our role in moving image
archiving
and preservation?
- How do reformatting
and
multiple formats
of the same work change how we look at a work? (e.g., are videos the
same
as films? Are digital photographs the same as analog photos?)
- Is there a social
context
to viewing
an object? (is viewing a video at home the same as viewing a film in a
theater? Is viewing a mural on a screen the same as viewing it in-situ?)
- Who attributes value
to a
work, and
under what circumstances? How does one deal with the different values
that
different communities may have towards any particular set of works?
- Are there ethical
considerations in
format conversions (e.g., film colorization, pan-and-scan?)
- Introduction to Appraisal, selection, description,
sorting,
organizing (15
min)
- Introduction to cataloging and value of description (60 min)
- Film Inspection, introduction to film repair tools
&
- Continuation of Risk Assessment and introduction to storage
of
moving
images (60 min)
- Current Events: (15 min)
- Riding
My Father's Motorcycle, Aleida Guevara, NY Times, Oct 9, 2004
- "To publish anything written by him that he himself
did not intend for publication - as is the case with the notes that
became "The Motorcycle Diaries" - serious editing work is required. We
can't omit text, but at the same time we can't be completely sure he
would have given his permission for the text to be published as it was
originally written. That is why we have a commitment to edit what he
wrote without changing what he meant - a very difficult task."
- Copyright--Entertainment
Industry Asks Justices to Rule on File Sharing, NY Times, Oct 12,
2004
- DRM--Cory Doctorow's Microsoft
Research talk, June 17, 2004 (another
version)
- Companies from different sectors entering the moving image
programming market
- , NY Times, Oct 9, 2004
- Assignments for next week