Techarchaeology: Works by James Coleman and Vito Acconci
Timothy J. Vitale · Journal of the American Institute for Conservation · 2001
Two very different pieces of installation art—Vito Acconci's Pornography in the Classroom (1975) and James Coleman's I N I T I A L S (1993–94)—are analyzed using the protocols pioneered at the TechArchaeology Symposium. The Acconci work has two video channels, one with audio soundtrack and a series of slides. It is a conceptual work that was reformatted in 1998. James Coleman's I N I T I A L S has one visual element-slides-with a synchronized audio channel output from four speakers. The differences are between a 25-year-old reformatted conceptual work (Acconci's) and a recent “structuralist's” work (Coleman's) that must be kept in its original format for the foreseeable future. This article is a result of TechArchaeology: A Symposium on Installation Art Preservation.