A conservação e a memória da arte contemporânea através da instituição museológica

Abstract

The Contemporary Art holds a wide variety of elements and configurations that make it difficult to assimilate by the majority part of the society and even more difficult to conserve and preserve its works. The complexity is huge when space, light and ideas are considered constitutive elements of an art work. All these innovations fetched big difficulties to the art museums and to the work of the conservator, who is responsible for guaranteeing the objects perennial. Aiming to investigate, analyze and register the criteria used by the contemporary art museum to preserve, conserve and keep its collection, having the Contemporary Art Museum of Rio Grande do Sul and the Contemporary Art Museum of São Paulo University cases of study as a basis, the present study has a central question: what are the criteria used by a contemporary art museum in the preservation, conservation and keeping processes of its collection? This research, that has a qualitative character, was developed from a study of bibliographical references and field research. With the aim of understanding how preservation, conservation and keeping of contemporary art collections occurs in Brazilian public museums, interviews with professionals responsible for these activities were performed in two researched institutions. Besides, the spaces where works of art are stored were analyzed, observing the conditions of storing, pieces sanitation and, besides other questions, such as HVAC and illumination of these environments. Since there is little in the bibliography about conservation of the contemporary art and the recent establishment of the criteria that give a basis for this activity, is expected that the results of this study can contribute to further researches related to this topic, to the museums here mentioned and other institutions that keep contemporary art collections.