As my annotated bibliography for my research paper is coming along, like expected I am encountering gaps in my territory. I am collecting mainly scholarly articles to connect voices and enter a conversation about the digitalization and preservation of art.
Scholars and experts in the field tend to agree that the digital archives of artistic artifacts are to be treated differently than the artifacts like records or books. This is a first gap in my understanding of artifacts because it is stated often that those artifacts require a specialized preservation policy but as to why was only briefly addressed. Brief descriptions discuss the qualities of art pieces that have different rights to the artist and contextual importance… but I will address that gap soon in future research.
In addition to the art-specific needs in addressing the digitalization of artifacts, another gap is in the policies proposed towards such preservation. I read an article about a case study of the creation of a digital archive preservation policy for the Boston Museum of Art. The BMA was received a grant to create a proposal to address the needs to preserve digital art and the preservation of art that was digitalized. The case study went on to describe the challenges in creating a policy to to the lack of policies to draw from.
The recent demand for archival policies is due to an increased use of internet in the recent past, hence, the digital preservation is the new field (specifically for art artifact digital preservation) that is in it’s infancy so there are bound to be gaps.
The research continues…