{"id":639,"date":"2019-03-02T17:00:18","date_gmt":"2019-03-02T22:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/?page_id=639"},"modified":"2019-03-02T17:01:10","modified_gmt":"2019-03-02T22:01:10","slug":"van-malssen","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/volume-4-2015-2016\/van-malssen\/","title":{"rendered":"Recovering the Eyebeam Collection Following Superstorm Sandy: Conservation Lessons for All Revealed by a Multimedia Disaster"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Kara Van Malssen
The Electronic Media Review, Volume Four: 2015-2016<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Abstract<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In\nthe fall of 2012, Superstorm Sandy struck the New York City region, destroying\nor badly damaging homes, businesses, and infrastructure. As is the case with\nall disasters, numerous cultural heritage materials, both personal and\ninstitutional, were amongst the damage. Once the storm passed, several museums,\nlibraries, archives, galleries and other collecting institutions across the\nregion, in particular those close to the city\u2019s numerous waterways, faced the\nrecovery of both their inundated buildings, as well as the artifacts contained within.\nAmongst those affected was Eyebeam, a non-profit art and technology center\ndedicated to exposing broad and diverse audiences to new technologies and media\narts. Founded in 1997, Eyebeam supports residen\u00adcies and fellowships by artists\nand creative technologists, stages exhibitions, and runs educational programs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since\nits inception, Eyebeam has collected the creative output of its residents and\nfellows\u2014including video, audio, and software-based artworks and their related\ndocumentation\u2014as well as recordings of the organization\u2019s numerous events. The\nresult is a growing collection of over 3,000 analog and digital media items,\nmany of these original art works, on formats ranging from data tapes and discs\ndating back to the late 1990s, to myriad video and audio formats. During the\nstorm, Eyebeam\u2019s building, located in Manhattan\u2019s West Chelsea, filled with\nthree to four feet of highly corrosive saltwater, submerging approximately 50%\nof this collection. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This\npresentation will tell the story of the expert-lead, volunteer-driven effort to\nurgently stabilize the Eyebeam media collection in the days that followed the\nstorm. The discussion will focus on methods used for establishing a network of\nresponders while day-to-day communication lines were down, working with trained\nand untrained volunteers, triage efforts, conserva\u00adtion techniques used for the\nvariety of formats, roles and teams, mechanisms used to mitigate risk of loss\nand further damage, and outcomes. The presentation will stress the critical\ndisaster preparedness and preventative conservation lessons that emerged\nthrough this experience, including the requirements of intellec\u00adtual control\nfor collections in today\u2019s data-driven conservation ecosystem, and the need for\nvaluation and prioritization within large collections. Chief amongst these\nlessons is the role that digitization and proper digital preservation can play\nin protecting heritage from disasters and conflict, not only for media collec\u00adtions,\nbut for collections of any kind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kara Van Malssen
Senior Consultant
AVPreserve<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kara Van MalssenThe Electronic Media Review, Volume Four: 2015-2016 Abstract In the fall of 2012, Superstorm Sandy struck the New York City region, destroying or badly damaging homes, businesses, and infrastructure. As is the case with all disasters, numerous cultural heritage materials, both personal and institutional, were amongst the damage. Once the storm passed, several … Continue reading “Recovering the Eyebeam Collection Following Superstorm Sandy: Conservation Lessons for All Revealed by a Multimedia Disaster”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":0,"parent":616,"menu_order":13,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-639","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=639"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/639\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources.culturalheritage.org\/emg-review\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}