Ben Fino-Radin: Fragile Bits and Dead Media: Preserving Computer Based Works of Art

The FVNMA Media Archeologies Institute is excited to present Ben Fino-Radin

What are the risks and threats in a collection of born-digital and computer based works of art? How do contemporary art conservators cope with inevitable obsolescence? What are contemporary art conservators at collecting institutions such as MoMA doing to ensure that museum goers will be able to interact with software based works of art for centuries to come? Ben Fino-Radin joins us to share a first-hand account of the trials and tribulations in the stewardship of MoMA's collection of born-digital works of art and design objects that already spans over five decades of the interaction between artists, designers, and technology.

&& on tuesday nov 12, Ben will lead a workshop titled Digital Archaeology: Resurrecting Dead Media at the SAIC Flaxman Library Special Collections from 1:00 - 4:00pm // RSVP at [email protected] to ensure a spot


> Ben Fino-Radin is a New York City based media archaeologist, archivist, and conservator of born-digital works of contemporary art. Formerly having served as Digital Conservator for Rhizome at the New Museum, today Fino-Radin is in practice at the Museum of Modern Art in the Department of Conservation, where he stewards the preservation of born-digital artworks and design objects, and manages the development of the Digital Repository for Museum Collections – the first museum collections oriented media conservation system of its kind. Fino-Radin's digital conservation research has been featured in the New York Times, The Verge, The Boston Globe, and Periscope Magazine.

http://benfinoradin.info/


> THE FVNMA MEDIA ARCHEOLOGIES INSTITUTE AT SAIC

The Film, Video, New Media, Animation department at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago will present a series of lectures and workshops that will take place throughout the Fall 2013 semester. Its main objective being to provide a site for inquiry into the burgeoning field of Media Archeology. Leading figures in the field will visit SAIC and present their research and various theory-practice approaches within the Media Archeological framework in order to inform, inspire, and initiate media-art practitioners and researchers in Chicago. Participants are this fall are: Erkki Huhtamo, Lori Emerson, Chris Ottinger, Ben Fino-Radin, and Nick Briz. All lectures and workshops are free and open to the public.