I am a freelance digital conservator based near London. I specialise in the preservation of software-based art and work with those caring for it to research, develop and implement strategies for its long-term preservation.
You can contact me at tom@tomensom.com.
Digital media is vulnerable to loss: hard drives fail, computer hardware becomes rapidly obsolete and file formats fall out of use. Maintaining access to artworks that depend on digital media requires an active approach of monitoring, assessment and intervention. To achieve this, a digital conservator works at the intersection of the traditions of cultural heritage conservation and digital preservation, applying their respective principles to caring for a variety of media types (e.g. video, software, web content) and the hardware required to access those media.
I have a particular interest and expertise in the conservation of artworks with software and computer components. These can be used in a wide variety of ways by artists e.g. to generate moving images, to publish web content or to control other electronic equipment. With their basis in the live execution of computer code, and the host of technologies needed to support this, such artworks pose various medium-specific conservation considerations that myself and colleagues in the conservation and preservation communities are working to address.
I regularly teach courses and workshops on digital conservation, software-based art conservation and related topics, including disk imaging and emulation. For more information and availability, please get in touch using the details at the top of this page.
My PhD research explored documentation theory and practice in the conservation of software-based art. This research was the result of an AHRC-funded Collaborative Doctoral Partnership Award between King's College London and Tate. The thesis was examined in November 2018 and passed with minor corrections. The thesis, titled Technical Narratives: Analysis, Description and Representation in the Conservation of Software-based Art, is available online via the King's College London Research Portal.
As a freelance digital conservator, I work with arts organisations and artists to:
I work regularly with Tate's Time-based Media Conservation team as a freelance acquisitions conservator and on two research projects, the Software-based Art Preservation project and the Preserving Immersive Media project.
If there's something you'd like to work with me on, please get in touch using the details at the top of this page.