Authenticity in Transition: Changing Practices in Contemporary Art Making and Conservation

Changing artistic practice is altering the way we interpret, conceive, conserve, collect and curate art with special reference to the concept of authenticity, artist intent and ultimately value. An ever increasing range of new materials and media used in the making of contemporary art, ranging from computers, video, sound, and ready-mades, to scent, food and other perishable and ephemeral matter, presents conservators and curators with huge challenges to the traditional concept of what is to be considered as authentic to the artwork. Handling the signs of decay in untested new materials in mixed media works, or the problems of rapidly obsolete 'high-tech' forcing the migration of equipment to present day technology, or respecting the concept of the ephemeral and intangible, while following the artist’s intention, are all highly problematic. Art practice in transition asks curators, collectors, conservators and visitors, to learn new ways of how to accommodate, exhibit, experience and appreciate contemporary art. We may have to consider multifaceted material, conceptual and contextual authenticities, in order to tackle the complex, but intriguing decision making processes when preserving contemporary artworks. Would it be better to let the work perish, or do we allow and accept change. Whose wishes should be respected, the maker’s or the owner/collector’s? This, as well as the roles of the curator and conservator, are all issues addressed by the authors of the papers in this volume who underline that any procedures undertaken in the conservation of contemporary works of art must not compromise the ‘authenticity’ but that new interpretations of this concept are needed to confront novel approaches in artistic practice