Case Study of Asian Art Archive

The Asian Art Archive in Hong Kong (AAA) was founded in 2000 with a strong sense of purpose to directly document and collect materials of contemporary art across Asia and make the information more publicly available on their own efforts. This was initiated by Claire Hsu, one of its founders, who felt an urgent need to do this after struggling to find materials on Chinese contemporary art while pursuing her Master's degree. Currently, AAA operates with about 30 employees, including curators, researchers, editors, and technicians, and functions as a non-profit organization with a focus on art research. During the last two decades since its establishment, AAA has been collecting over 50,000 secondary resources for the library collections and has released over 76,000 digitized primary resources online. In the library, it holds exhibitions regularly based on archival research, sensory performances and workshops through collaborating with partnered artists and communities. By documenting new insights gained through the process of archival research and exhibitions, AAA attempts to foster an active circulation of archiving and utilization of research resources. Senior Curator Özge Ersoy emphasized that AAA, where activities are always centered around collection artists, continuously questions and examines their creation process and presentation of the artworks, so that AAA’s research and archival activities could help understand artists’ thoughts and the history of their creative activities narratively.

Case Study of the Getty Research Institute

The Getty Research Institute (GRI), based in Los Angeles, USA, was established with affluent funds from the J.P. Getty Trust, which was founded by the American industrialist, J.P. Getty, in 1953. The GRI opened in 1954 as a specialized organization dedicated to researching and preserving Western-art-centered collections and archives of the Getty Museum. Nowadays, extensive archives including approximately 100,000 valuable materials are managed by a total of 117 employees. The GRI also assigns a specialized team to manage a large-scale database, which plays a significant role for art researchers on the globe, and ensures it remains up-to-date. In addition to initiatives from running a research library to holding exhibitions, the GRI offers grants and residential research program, which has accepted 1,800 scholars from over 59 countries since its establishment in 1985, said Kara Olidge, the Associate Director of GRI. In recent years, the GRI has been expected to transform its traditional management policies and operation to be more transparent and updated to embrace diversity and inclusion. Under the new leadership since 2020, the GRI has raised sustainability and DEAI** as core operational principles and has undertaken thorough measures to restructure the organization and programs, from reviewing facility services to changing the mindset of staff involved, which leads to a substantial change for the long term both internally and externally.

Case Study of the National Center for Art Research, Japan

As one of the initiatives led by Research Resources Group at the National Center for Art Research, the research portal “Art Platform Japan” dedicated to informing on Japanese modern and contemporary art was introduced. Other initiatives presented were the translation project of important Japanese literatures and their online publication, background stories and main features about "Japanese Museum Collections Search ‘SHŪZŌ’,” which disseminates information of Japanese museum collections, and the "Dictionary of Artists in Japan,” which shares profiles and exhibition information of Japanese artists both available in Japanese and English. In Japan, many art institutions have not yet been able to fully digitize and publish their collection information due to the lack of specialized personnel or insufficient funding. Based on this context, these initiatives are pioneering and significant for meticulously and comprehensively disseminating information on Japan's modern and contemporary art and museum collections both domestically and internationally. Moving forward, it is crucial to continue improving the data infrastructure and dissemination platform, and to expand the amount of publishable data available for research, while keeping an eye on technological advancements and domestic and international demand. The potential for future broad-based collaboration to utilize the research resources with a global perspective was also suggested during the session.

Case Study of Hzone: Collaboration with Enterprises

In recent years, Korea’s presence on the international art scene has been steadily increasing. Hzone, based in Seoul, Korea, is an organization that develops various international projects through art consulting. Lee Daehyung, the founder, and director of Hzone, emphasized the importance of collaboration across boundaries while reading trends of the times, based on an analysis of the trends in arts projects in the international community in the 21st century. Daehyung highlighted successful examples such as the “CONNECT, BTS” project in 2020, which connected five cities worldwide through music and contemporary art, and the “Hyundai Tate Research Centre: Transnational” partnership made between Tate Modern and Hyundai Motors during his tenure there. He also addressed the potential for museums to approach global issues from an artistic perspective, by creatively realizing partnerships and social practices that are not restricted by existing frameworks, with partners that have different strengths, such as enterprises and governmental entities.

In the discussion, panelists addressed issues related to personnel and capacity faced by each organization while sharing their thoughts on the ideal way of establishing sustainable partnerships by leveraging each other’s specialized fields. For instance, AAA and GRI have explored partnerships respectively with local museums and universities, where the partner institutions take charge of preserving and managing physical materials, while AAA and GRI handle the digitization and online data publication of these materials. This mutually complementary practice allows both parties to utilize their strengths effectively. Such collaboration in the joint management and online publication of archival materials is believed to maximize the effective use of limited research resources and enable a larger number of users to access information. Furthermore, it was also discussed that such partnerships should be mutually beneficial, leading not only to the exchange of expertise and technology, but also to the realization of their respective missions and the public interest.

Discussion at the symposium
Photo courtesy: Sengoku Ken (.new)

The National Center for Art Research aims to enhance the international reputations of Japanese contemporary art. We will continue to introduce diverse practices from museums and research organizations worldwide, create opportunities for dialogue, and strive to contribute to the promotion of museum activities throughout Japan.