Representing the output of the research project ""Performance: Conservation, Materiality, Knowledge,"" this volume brings together diverse voices, methods and formats in the discussion and practice of performance conservation.
Conservators, artists, curators and scholars explore the ontology of performance art through its creation and institutionalization into an astonishing range of methods and approaches for keeping performance alive and well, whether inside museum collections or through folk traditions. Anchored in the disciplines of contemporary art conservation, art history and performance studies, the contributions range far beyond these to include perspectives from anthropology, musicology, dance, law, heritage studies and other fields. While its focus is on performance as understood in the context of contemporary art, the book’s notion of performance is much wider, including other media such as music, theater and dance as well as an open-ended concept of performance as a vital force across culture(s).
While providing cutting-edge research on an emerging and important topic, this volume remains accessible to all interested readers, allowing it to serve as a singularly valuable resource for museum professionals, scholars, students and practitioners.
Section 1: Expanding scholarly approaches to the longevity of performance 1. “Once Upon a Time:” Performative Ultra-Conceptualism and Storytelling as Conservation—Florence Jung 2. Contesting Heritage: Artistic and Cultural (Re)appropriations of Apulian Tarantism 3. Can We Conserve Music? 4. Curating Performance as Conservation? Thoughts on Queer Communion: Ron Athey 5. Can We Conserve Performance? A Conversation with Hanna B. Hölling, Jules Pelta Feldman and Emilie Magnin Section 2: Confronting institutions 6. Performance in the Museum: Shifting Roles in Performance Art Stewardship 7. Reviving Culture: Puawai Cairns’ Vision for Dynamic Museums and Performance Conservation—A Conversation with Jules Pelta Feldman 8. Black Art Conservators Valinda Carroll, Kayla Henry-Griffin, Nylah Byrd and Ariana Makau on Black Objects, Performance and the Future of Conservation––A Conversation with Hanna B. Hölling, Jules Pelta Feldman and Emilie Magnin 9. Conserving “Us:” Caring for Living Heritage, Oral Tradition and Indigenous Knowledge—A Conversation with Emilie Magnin 10. Copyright Implications of Preservation of Performance Art Section 3: Conservation through artistic and embodied practice 11. Davide-Christelle Sanvee’s La performance des performances as Critical Conservation 12. Rosanna Raymond on Conser.VĀ.tion—A Conversation with Hanna B. Hölling, Jules Pelta Feldman and Emilie Magnin 13. Dance, Embodied Preservation, and Unlearning in India—A Conversation with Hanna B. Hölling, Jules Pelta Feldman and Emilie Magnin 14. RYXPER1126AE, 2018 15. In Strange Hands—A Conversation with Hanna B. Hölling, Jules Pelta Feldman and Emilie Magnin 16. Performance Conservation as a Political Act—A Conversation with Hanna B. Hölling 17. A Manifesto: Towards Conservative Performance
Hanna B. Hölling is Research Professor at Bern Academy of the Arts and Honorary Associate Professor, University College London. Jules Pelta Feldman was formerly Postdoctoral Fellow at Bern Academy of the Arts and is now Assistant Researcher at the Department of History of Art, University of California, Berkeley. Emilie Magnin is a Doctoral Candidate at Bern University and Bern University of Applied Sciences—Academy of the Arts and a Conservator for Media Art and Installations at the Kunstmuseum Bern.
