INCCA Student Café pt.6: Time-Based Media

We are excited to announce the Sixth INCCA Student Café: Student & Early Career Research – Time-Based Media, focusing on the long-term preservation challenges posed by complex time-based media artworks.

Presentations will be given by Isobel Finlay, Bird Nord, Chang Lan, Mariana Passos, Mirjam Chair, and Olivia Schoenfeld. The talks cover a diverse range of research and practical conservation projects, including re-digitization strategies for video works, maintenance of CRT-based installations, emulation of obsolete multimedia formats, documentation frameworks for undocumented video installations, preservation approaches for analogue film, and disk imaging as a strategy for computer-based artworks.

The first presentation discusses a conservation treatment of David (2004) by Sam Taylor-Johnson, detailing the re-digitization of the work from the artist's Digital Betacam submaster for long-term preservation. The second talk will explore the care and maintenance of CRT-based video artworks, providing a practical toolkit for conservators to safely perform diagnostics and minor repairs. Additionally, the next talk will investigate the preservation of obsolete multimedia artworks, with a focus on Joy Gregory's web-based Blonde (1998), using emulation and source code analysis to ensure ongoing access. The following talk will discuss the study of Dara Birnbaum's Kiss the Girls: Make Them Cry (1979), highlighting documentation strategies and collaborative approaches to preserve complex media installations acquired without records. The fifth presentation will examine strategies for exhibiting analogue film, using Tacita Dean's Craneway Event (16mm) to explore preservation, projection, and hybrid workflows in a museum context. The final presentation will present hands-on research on disk imaging for Brody Condon's DeRezFX.Kill(KarmaPhysics (2004–2006), evaluating technical workflows and accessibility across systems to inform digital preservation practices.

The talks will be followed by an open and informal conversation with all speakers and participants.

For better language accessibility we provide English live caption and Portuguese AI translation during this event. All are welcome to join. The INCCA Student Café pt.6 will be hosted online via Zoom on 23rd October 2025, 5pm CEST (Amsterdam 5pm / London 4pm / Seoul 12pm / Mexico City 9am / LA 8am) and will not be recorded.

Image credit: Image of Isobel Finlay Re-Digitising "David" (2004) by Sam Taylor-Johnson in UCL's Media Conservation Lab. Image by Brian Castriota.