The importance of the artist in the documentation of the current works of art

1Today, life is part of art, not just figuratively. Many artworks include living beings as constituents elements. This statement accounts for the processes of transformation and evolution undergone in the field of art since the middle of the twentieth century. As a result of these processes of evolution, a great variety of artistic tendencies appeared and made use of artistic elements not present in art until that moment. These new elements, used with a specific aesthetic or sensory intention, have brought new challenges for conservators-restorers. The reality is that today the restorer needs, before undertaking any intervention process, to understand the semantic plane of the work of art, to know the meaning of the matter, and, above all, to determine where the quiddity of the artwork resides, and this, in the face of the possibility of premature ruins, the replacement of parts, or even the re-edition of objects endowed with "artisticity".

2One objective of this study has been to conduct a theoretical reflection on these concepts, but entering fully into the need of conservation and restoration. Thus, direct contact has been made with some representative artists, so that their opinion on how the passage of time will affect the significance of their artworks has been gathered. These examples will serve to show how the same fact, the transformation of matter as an effect of the agents of deterioration, can affect meaning differently, according to each artist. In this line of analysis, and understanding the need and opportunity to gather the direct testimony of the creators themselves, and after having carried out a series of personal interviews, we provide their point of view on what really constitutes the essentiality of their works, paying special attention to the relationship between idea and matter, and emphasizing the description, for each case, of the artistic intention, even understanding that the concepts of artistic intention or meaning of the work of art are used with little precision in the discipline of conservation of contemporary art and need to be defined, Mieke Bal (2002:30-31).

3An important achievement of the study is through the interviews it has been possible to compile a large amount of information that, from the perspective of the creator of the work of art, can be useful to understand from a direct source, how the artist perceives the inevitable transformation of his artworks, and how this transformation might or might not affect significance.

4In any case, contemporary work of art becomes an entity capable of evolving before the spectator's sometimes perplexed gaze. This process of transformation is often premeditated, because the artist creates his artwork for a specific space, a specific place and time of exhibition, of which it will be the fruit. At the same time, as happens with installations, after a period of time, the idea can materialize again, producing changes in appearance of the work of art in this second moment of life and in many occasions, until the substitution of the pristine matter. This happens, with the knowledge and consent of the author.

5For all these reasons, suitability of compiling information on the intention and significance of the work of art, on the aesthetic discourse and on the intellectual universe of the artist is evident. But it is also necessary to gather information on how they understand what is authentic in their production, what is truly essential, what is immutable, in order to define when the artwork could become a ruin. The concept of ruin is very interesting in contemporary art, but in this study we only point out the possibility of extracting from these encounters information about when, that is, about the moment in which, according to its own creator, the matter of the artwork would cease to be able of carrying meaning (Fig. 1). Of course, it is also a good moment to obtain information on how gradual aging and the consequent transformation of appearance will affect conceptual issues of their artworks.

6In order to analyse these questions, we have selected some of the most representative artists we have had the opportunity to be in touch, so that this document becomes not only a theoretical reflection, but also a testimony of the intention and guidelines given by themselves for the better understanding and enjoyment of their artworks.

The passage of time on contemporary art. Mutation and change of the matter

7Can a recent work of art have become a ruin? Cesare Brandi defines the concept of ruin as "[...] the extreme case of a manufacture, reduced to a barely recognizable testimony of a work (or of a human event) but already incapable - in the case of a work of art - of being brought back to "potential unity" without becoming a copy or a falsification of itself and which, therefore, can only be preserved, not restored" (Basile, 2007: 82).

8This definition is visibly directed towards traditional art, towards conventional art, because it presents an exclusive attention towards matter, leaving aside an absolutely essential aspect in the case of contemporary art: the conceptual part of the work, that is, the importance of the idea, which was the first thing in the work, and which for many artists has the same importance, or even more, than the matter itself. We have observed how an artist have re-edited some of their works, due of the poor state of the matter, dating the new object with the initial date of the first one. On one case more than thirty years had passed between them.

9Cesare Brandi's theory tackles the problem of the ruin of the work of art by pointing out in that state the artwork can only be intervened in the sense of conservation. However, when the quiddity of the artwork, the essential, is deposited in a certain state of matter, and this has been altered, and although we are not before the almost unrecognizable testimony of an artwork, we could be in front a ruin. In the face of this situation, the artists themselves usually point out that "the artwork does not work", referring to the fact that what is essential in creation has been affected. For this assumption, Brandi's definition is limited, because we are not in the presence "[...] of the extreme case of a manufacture, of the almost unrecognizable testimony of an artwork". This bad condition of matter could be not excessively serious, and yet irreversibly affect the intentional values deposited in it.

10This is the case of José María Yturralde's 1972 artwork Prisma 4. Faced with small deformations in the pictorial surface caused by the movement of nails, the artist has again applied all the layers of colour (Soraluze/Llamas, 2008: 111-116)). For this artist, who has a production based on flat or degraded color ink, the state of the surface is essential, and in his opinion, a small degradation greatly affects the work of art. Thus, the importance of the conceptual plane for the artist is fundamental, and restorers must put it into value after having understood that in artworks where matter becomes the protagonist, it is usually loaded with a series of semantic, symbolic and aesthetic values that substantiate it and endow it with meaning (Muñoz, 2003: 49-58; Verbeeck-Boutin, 2009; Breuil, 2011; Szmelter, 2013).

11We can to point out how important the figure of the artist is, in order to determine the point at which the condition of matter would begin not to be acceptable. And also how important are the interviews with contemporary artists that are carried out with the intention of documenting and having collected, at least for the most significant ones, questions that refer to the essentiality of the artworks and to the effects of the passage of time on them, in order to know their repercussion on quiddity.

12On the other hand, it is probable that we would be surprised at the little importance the artist gives in some cases to the matter, to the point of proposing the substitution in the face of some technical problems. The case of installations is an example, since many of their elements are substituted or modified being the artists themselves who give the guidelines on what is essential to preserve and what elements should not be preserved, because they are anecdotal and because, in this case, there is no need for the uniqueness of the artistic object. This sector of contemporary art should be studied under a new paradigm, that of performance pointed out by René Van de Vall (2017), and not under the paradigm of scientific conservation.

13It is obvious that we are faced with new situations that move us away from the auratic artwork described by Benjamin (2003: 42-57), an artwork in which "value for worship" prevails and which is endowed with an aura and an unrepeatable character given its uniqueness. The passage of time is a circumstance that affects the artists themselves. It is possible to find, when comparing interviews with some of them, that, after some years the opinion on the conservation of their works, or on the treatment that should be given to the matter, has changed. There are several reasons that can affect this mutation of intention, among them the pressure of the art market itself.

14It is important to reflect about how temporality affects the processes of meaning production. In recent years attention has been paid to the importance of memory and temporality in cultural terms (Huyssen, 2002: 217-237). From the 1960s onwards, the search for identity and the need to define tradition became evident, which led to theoretical tendencies that promulgated the negation of the individual and of art. According to this author, we would find ourselves facing a boom in memory, an upsurge translated in some cases into the production of entropic-type works such as Les Lieux de mémoire (Nora, 1984-1992), and on other occasions, an excessive interest in musealisation as a perpetuating activity of memory.

15We could understand that need for documentation of the artworks is framed in this last tendency, which evidences, in a certain way, the fear of oblivion (Fig. 2,3,4,).

16Entering the field of conservation-restoration, we think that it is necessary to document the artist's intention at a very early stage in the creation of the work of art, because, as we said, with passage of time, the artists themselves evolve, and could modify the initial intention. In this regard, early testimony guarantees that the work of art is understood, respected, and sometimes safeguarded from its own creator. There are cases in which the artist himself has retaken a work of art and re-done it to a great extent introducing a second moment of creation, possible fact when the moral rights over the artwork are used. However in words of Gianni Colombo "[...] an author feels frustrated if he is asked to passively reconstruct something he has already done and cannot afford any evolution, any change or innovation in a past artistic experience" (Colombo, 2005: 113). This point is interesting for restorers, who must collaborate with the artists, from a position of respect towards the artwork, understanding that in the decision-making process it can play a fundamental hermeneutical role, but studying how far the figure of the artist can go.

17Artists must understand their limitations when it comes to restoring their own artworks, since in doing so they face several difficulties: ignorance of the deontological code of the profession; ignorance of the technical procedures proper to the discipline of conservation and restoration; and the aforementioned difficulty of distancing themselves from being the creators of the work of art.

18However, conservators, once change has been assumed as a constant phenomenon, should not insist on keeping the artwork unchanged, in a single authentic state, because the passage of time will have an inevitable effect on it. What do we intend to document it as early as possible? First of all, not which should be its ideal and permanent authentic state, because this permanence is impossible, but what constitutes what is really important for the artist, what affects the quiddity of the work of art, what must remain unchanged over the years so that there is no loss of authenticity.

19This question must be posed to the artist, who is often confronted for the first time with such theoretical issues. In any case, not all interviews with artists acquire the same degree of depth by focusing some of them on purely technical questions. However, the specific documentation, focused on the semantic aspects of matter (Llamas, 2014) and the search for what truly constitutes authenticity in each case, is very useful for understanding of the history of contemporary art.

20It is not possible to find a single point of authenticity in the artworks, much less in current art. Sometimes, in addition to that, from the initial moment of creation, the work of art could have been conceived with the desire for change or premeditated mutation of matter. Could we insist on maintaining an artistic installation constituted by loaves floating on the sea, in the state it was in at the initial moment? When the artwork disappears, is there the possibility of re-materialization? Does the authenticity of the work of art reside in its uniqueness, in the artist's hand, or in the originality of the pristine matter? Faced with this type of question, that should be discussed in the interviews, a change of paradigm was obviously necessary, a change of ethical code that would help us to find where the authenticity of works of art resides when the matter that served to concretize the idea will only exist for a certain period of time.

The search for the essential in the work of some Spanish artists. How degradation may or may not affect to substantial

Juan Genovés

21We will begin by talking about the artist Juan Genovés, a referent in the Spanish panorama who was part of the group "Hondo" in the sixties. This group burst in as an option that tried to overcome the expressionist models of the El Paso group, as well as the normative and cold proposals of the moment. Its particularity was that the group opted for a new figuration, but without completely breaking with the informalist roots (Guash, 1997: 137).

22Genovés is above all a painter, a painter who is concerned about the conservation of his artworks. We are dealing with an artist of two-dimensional production, who produces pictorial work. But his works of art are not made with traditional materials. The artist uses canvases glued directly on a plywood; a board made of wood veneers that alternate the direction of the fiber. Then, as a pictorial layer, he uses acrylic emulsion colors, painting directly on the canvases, without preparation.

23What does Juan Genovés like about acrylic painting? The intensity, the brightness, the life it transmits. Genovés insisted on numerous occasions on his concern for the state of conservation of his works. He expressed his concern for using good materials; for him, materials must behave correctly, they must be stable and remain in good condition over time. The saturation of color is an essential aspect in his artistic production, the appearance must be vibrant, the color intense, and this must last as long as possible. For this reason the artist himself selected the best materials and carried out simple aging tests.

24Once this essential issue is known, we can imagine that the passage of time becomes a destructive agent in this case. The artist himself commented how, when he personally saw the work of the Pop artists, it had seemed to him that they were as if they were dead, that they possessed a matter that was already old. That concern is present in his words.

25When will matter cease to serve experimentation? The chromatic balance is essential in the case of this artist, he himself explains that he creates his artworks relying on a certain degradation. “...] I trust that the painting will be alive in many years, even if the canvas has yellowed a little. I would not like them to age. What does matter to me is that what I paint on the canvas stays alive and strong...”

26We think that, although the passage of time and exposure to physical and chemical agents of deterioration will also affect the material plane, Genovés has used good materials to make his works, so they will be alive for much longer. In this case we cannot replace the material, we can only apply a good preventive conservation so that the chromatic balance is not altered for many years.

José María Yturralde

27On the other hand, an artist who presents a totally different problem is José María Yturralde, mentioned above. José María Yturralde is an artist who, after the crisis of Spanish informalism in the 1950s, joined a group of artists who worked under the name of the New Generation (Guash, 1997: 257). This group formed by artists with a heterogeneous character was influenced by pop art and kinetic art, and was divided into two different styles, one more figurative and the other abstract and rationalist, influenced by constructivism. Our artist placed himself in this second tendency. Concerned about science and the appearance of computers, he used these tools to increase the possibilities of artistic creation. Thus, his work explores the possibilities of perfection.

28At present, Yturralde produces delicate artworks of flat ink, or color degradation, which are very delicate in terms of conservation, since they are extremely sensitive to mechanical damage (Aliaga/García, 1998: 305-307). The complexity of restoration of the pictorial layer in these cases is evident: poor handling results in pathologies such as erosions and small lacunae, which have an extremely complex pictorial reintegration.

29As for material issues, the artist himself has pointed out his concern for the perfection of the technique and his interest in the use of a matte varnish. He has also pointed out, like many other authors, that the matte or glossy finish can completely modify the experimentation of his works: “[...] whether the surface is glossy or matte completely changes the work” (J.M. Yturralde, personal communication, May 6, 2006).

30We have described a delicate work, with a high conceptual load deposited on the pictorial surface and its finishes, which can suffer alterations easily, and whose color reintegration is very complicated. And it is obvious that the passage of time will inevitably produce changes in the material. These changes will affect the tone, although in this case the artist has not expressed any concern. But the change will also affect the condition of the pictorial layer since the manipulation of the works will inevitably produce problems in the surfaces. In the words of the artist: “[...] the nails and their alterations on the surface destroy the work more than the slight change in color or tone” (J.M. Yturralde, personal communication, May 6, 2006).

31It should be noted that the artist himself has remade several of his works in view of the poor state of conservation of the material. This seems a very intrusive intervention for conservators. But for the artist it is absolutely natural. Once we have assumed that the work consists of a conceptual plane, added to a material and biographical one, the fact of replacing the material, since it no longer serves to bring our entity “work of art” to experimentation, becomes an acceptable fact, and does not affect the authenticity of the work.

32The objective of this study was to focus on when the matter of the artworks ceased to serve experimentation. We have just specified it for the case of José María Yturralde: in his case, at a very subtle point of degradation. And we are sure of this, since the artist himself determined that exact point in the existence of the work, the point at which the matter could no longer bring it to phenomenological experimentation This is a rather extreme case, as the pathologies were not too serious, especially for a traditional work of art, and yet, in this example, the artist himself was responsible for repainting the entire artwork. In other words: the essential properties of the entity had been affected very early on.

33The artist himself points out that the re-edition does not pose any ethical problem for him: “[...] I have remade many impossible figures because they were treated very badly” (J.M. Yturralde, personal communication, May 6, 2006). But what status does the new artistic object have, we think, that of original. The substitution of the material has not affected the authenticity of the work, since, in addition, it is the artist himself who has made the reedition.

Miquel Barceló

34Miquel Barceló is one of the most internationally recognized artists today. His works can be found in major museums and cities around the world. But what is the significance of matter in the work of this artist in relation to artistic intention? At what point of alteration will it be unable to carry significance? In short, how will this matter evolve over time, and how will this transformation, due to degradation, affect the conceptual issues of his works?

35Miquel Barceló is an artist who is particularly concerned with matter. This concern for the passage of time and its effect is present from his early years as an artist, because very early on he began to work with the transformation of matter and its aesthetic repercussions. Thus, he began using elements that could rot and that he placed in boxes, such as meat, to take advantage of the transformation of rotting as a pictorial element.

36At this initial moment of production Barceló suffered a rejection of painting and intended to make “anti-painting”, so he used perishable organic materials that were intentionally degraded, although according to his words “this did not mean that he was not making paint anyway” because the materials were used with a pictorial intention. That is to say, he realized that he intended to make “anti-painting”, but he continued to make a pictorial use of the transformation of matter. Faced with this fact, he decided to use elements traditionally understood as imperfections to generate his artworks, and, for example, in the case of ceramics, he used cracks, irregularities and holes, precisely as a theme. And going into what interests us as conservators, in the case of this artist, the time present in his works is a geological time. As he himself explains, he is concerned with longevity and perennialism, although, also, on other occasions, he has included the processual aspect as a constructive agent.

37We need to explain briefly what his works consist of and how time and transformation are used in them, in order to focus again on the objective of this article, which, as we have said, is to study when matter could cease to serve the experimentation of the entity, giving several different examples. In the case of Miquel Barceló, the transformation, the mutation of matter, the natural aging produced by the agents of deterioration, will not be a problem in relation to the correct experimentation of his production. We find ourselves before the opposite point to the one explained above. In this case, the alterations, cracks, flaws... are elements that configure the work of art, elements that, far from being a problem for experimentation, are part of it. That is to say: on many occasions Barceló uses time as a construction agent.

38In relation to the existence of artworks already situated in the interval of duration, deformations and degradations will be inserted in time in a natural way, they will be included in the works as elements that complement them. For this reason, his creations will have a long duration since the natural degradation of the material will not be a conflict for his correct experimentation.

39Barceló is a committed artist who creates distinct types of artworks, in constant plastic research. Sometimes he also creates non-processual works, and then, his concern for the use of stable and quality materials is palpable. This would be the case of the work made for the decoration of the dome of the Hall of Human Rights and the Alliance of Civilizations in the United Nations Palace in Geneva. In this work, he notes, “[...] we used a vinyl resin. We were working together with restorers for everything related to the control of materials”.

Miquel Navarro

40Miquel Navarro is a Valencian sculptor who since the seventies has been dedicated to three-dimensional art (Guash, 2000: 309-310). He is an artist influenced by Russian constructivism and the work of Julio González, another preceding Valencian artist of great repercussion. Navarro has selected refractory and metallic materials with which he makes simple three-dimensional pieces that recall and are inspired by the buildings of large cities. These pieces are used to materialize urban spaces in the halls of museums.

41Once again, we will try to specify which aspects of his works are essential, in order to establish, once we understand that the passage of time will have an impact on the material, whether change and degradation will affect essential issues.

42Miquel Navarro points out: “[...] I do care about the passage of time and that is why I use clay. I use it because I have discovered that clay is one of the materials that lasts the longest, just like stone and noble metals”.

43In this case we have a type of work in which the artist has selected the materials thinking about their long-term duration. Miquel Navarro is especially concerned with duration, with the stability of the works. The material serves the experimentation of the entity, and according to his words, the material has to be in good condition to be able to correctly carry the meaning of the artwork.

44Navarro explains in the interview that his works of art must be well maintained that he accepts the repainting of the pictorial layers in the case of three-dimensional sculptures, large format, exposed to the outside (Fig. 5). He does not mind the substitution of the matter; in case it is necessary for the perception of the work to be correct. In fact, he himself points out that his pieces are, to a certain extent, repetitive. He himself assumes repetition, which is why he indicates that he would be in favour of replacing some of them, if their condition is not adequate.

45And how would this affect the authenticity of the artwork, we think it would not affect that authenticity, since what the entity is, does not depend on the material. It would affect other more relevant issues, such as the erroneous arrangement of the pieces in space, that is to say, errors in the installation. This would be a problem, since it would affect the perception of the artwork and, as we say, its authenticity.

46And what kind of time does the work present? This type of creation is inserted, as installations, in an eternal present, they have a constant starting point in which they are perceived by the spectator.

47Here, the passage of time is not a problem for the matter, we insist. In this case the matter is very stable, the artist has taken care of that by selecting durable materials in the case of the installations. On the other hand, should any damage occur, the small pieces that resemble buildings can be replaced without affecting authenticity. So how can time affect conservation? In this case we think that the passage of time can affect the authenticity of Navarro's works to the extent that they are not properly documented. If they are not installed according to the proper indications, then yes, we could be affecting the authenticity, as the artwork would not be what it should be.

48On the other hand, in relation to his three-dimensional sculpture exposed to the elements, which continually degrades due to exposure to agents of deterioration and vandalism, a fact that is of particular concern to him, constant repainting and maintenance is the artist's desired option. Again, the work of art brought back to its initial state without loss of authenticity.

Conclusions

49Works of art are entities that evolve in time. Change and mutation are inevitable and are inserted in the interval of duration of the work of art. Works of art are constituted by different planes: the conceptual, the material, and the biographical. All of them superimposed on each other configure their consistency. The understanding of this consistency is the objective of documentation, because thanks to it we can know the essential and anecdotal properties of these. In this sense, the interpretation of the work of art must be the first step in any intervention.

50In order to transmit to the future correctly we must know the consistency. Since the passage of time will produce discrepancies between the condition of the matter and its ability to carry meaning, it is necessary to know which elements of the artworks are essential and which elements are anecdotal. These constituent elements of the entity can be specified for both the tangible and intangible spheres, since, faced with the usual dilemma of not being able to preserve them all, it will be necessary to opt for those that are essential. The properties of works of art determine their consistency, which is why conservators must maintain them over the years.

51In this study we have analyzed, for the case of some important artists, what properties the matter treasures in relation to the artistic entity and how the passage of time and natural degradation can alter them, affecting the correct experimentation. The passage of time can be a constructive agent, when its effect has been used in a premeditated way; or a destructive agent, when it degrades the matter or causes forgetfulness and lack of understanding. In relation to the natural aging of works, the conservator is faced with two situations. In one, the artist has counted on the logical evolution of a poor quality material, or poorly combined with each other, so that the degradation is assumed and could even emphasize the artistic intention. In the other, the same degradation could have a negative character.

52The study of the quiddity, that is, of the form that determines that a matter is this or that thing, is link ed to the study of the essence. Knowing the essence of a work of art is of interest to us, because when the loss of the properties that made up that essence has finally occurred, then we could speak of the cessation of the entity. On the other hand, when there really is a discrepancy between the condition in which the matter is and what is expected of it, then we would have to study the status of the artistic object.