Chapter One: Introduction

This research aims to enhance user interactions with online art collections, advancing the educational and scholarly dimensions of art museum engagement. A significant challenge for museum professionals is recognising the how objects have changed in the process of digitisation. Digitisation does not just create ‘photographic’ reproductions; it generates unique digital entities that circulate independently. As the museum’s control over user interpretation online diminishes, this research proposes a reimagination of the curator’s role from interpreter to facilitator within emerging digital artefact ecologies.

As both a curator and researcher, I explore the digitised collection and archival resources of A David Bomberg Legacy – The Sarah Rose Collection. By engaging with this online collection, I develop modes of presentation, performance, and user interaction to understand the ontological nature of digitised collections. It examines the connections between curatorial methodologies and the distinctive online dynamics between digitised collections and users. Through analysis of an online platform and related workshops, this project seeks to unravel the complexities of digital collections, integrating them into networks that transcend traditional museum boundaries.

Digitisation does not obliterate the epistemology of collections; rather, it expands it. While the traditional epistemology of physical collections is rooted in their materiality, provenance, and contextual relationships within a physical space, digitised collections offer new dimensions of knowledge and interpretation.

Digital collections allow for greater accessibility, enabling a broader audience to interact with and interpret the artworks. This can help democratise knowledge and provide diverse perspectives that were previously limited by geographical and physical constraints. The digital medium also facilitates innovative modes of engagement, such as virtual exhibitions, interactive multimedia, and augmented reality experiences, which can enhance understanding and appreciation in ways that physical collections cannot. However, this shift is not without loss – the context and physicality of the original artefacts can be diminished, potentially leading to a loss of certain types of knowledge that are tied to the tactile and spatial experience of the objects. The epistemology of digital collections is not obliterated but redefined. It encompasses new methods of knowledge production and dissemination while maintaining connections to the historical and contextual significance of the original artefacts. This emerging epistemology requires curators and researchers to adopt new roles as facilitators of digital engagement in the online context.

Understanding these new digital objects requires grasping their materiality, as emphasised by scholars like Jussi Parikka and Katrina Sluis. Recognising their materiality involves acknowledging how technical aspects like code and data storage intertwine with cultural representations of imagery and narrative. This perspective aligns with Walter Benjamin’s insights on reproduction and representation, underscoring the importance of considering materiality in reproduction processes.

This research broadens the perspective of the digital object, challenging the traditional role of digitised objects as representations of offline artefacts and questioning their categorization as either “collection” or “archive”. Instead, it emphasises the interconnected relationships among various elements in the creative process, prompting a re-evaluation of institutional practices in archiving and presenting digital art within museums.

The relationship between the Internet and the museum is complex. The traditional view of the digital image as a tool for record-keeping and marketing fails to grasp the materiality and circulation of digital artefacts. This necessitates a cultural understanding of the Internet’s role within the museum, beyond its technical aspects. As users navigate online museum spaces, the curator’s authority shifts, placing greater emphasis on user interpretation and engagement. Practitioners must adapt their practices to engage with the machine and navigate the complexities of digital representation. In this context, the concept of trace, as opposed to record, becomes crucial, highlighting the relational nature and temporality of digital artefacts.

Ultimately, this research addresses the institutional challenges posed by digitisation, necessitating a re-evaluation of the knowledge museums need to effectively engage with digital artefacts and facilitate user experiences. By addressing these complexities, the project aims to shed new light on the dynamics of digital museum engagement and enhance the integration of digitised collections into expanded networks beyond traditional museum boundaries.

The contributions of this research to the field of digital humanities and museum studies are significant. It provides a nuanced understanding of the materiality of digital artefacts and redefines curatorial roles in the digital age. Beneficiaries include museum professionals, educators, and users seeking to deepen their engagement with digital collections. This project offers new methodologies and frameworks for integrating digitised artefacts into broader cultural and educational networks, enriching the public's interaction with art.

1.1 Context

In 2017 I began my role as curator of A David Bomberg Legacy – The Sarah Rose Collection, a body of Modern British artworks by selected members of the Borough Group. I curate and care for the physical and digital collection, commission new digital work and plan workshops and events. In my role as the curator of the collection, I have expanded the site of curatorial production to include the Internet, and the archive of digitised material associated with the collection. Developing my online curatorial position, I looked to research to deepen my practice and situate my projects on a research footing. The practice as research model offers a way to continue to curate the online collection as framed by a series of research questions around the implications of curating online. This project provided a structure to critically reflect on my online curation of the A David Bomberg Legacy – The Sarah Rose Collection, and tests new tools that incorporate the care, outreach and curation required of the digital collection.

My work with the collection comes at a time when museums are reconsidering the role of their digital collections within their organisations. During the pre-1990s analogue era, museums operated predominantly through analogue methods, relying on physical photographs, written records, and manual cataloguing systems for collection management and exhibition design. Accessibility to museum collections was limited to physical visits, hindering broader public engagement. The 1990s marked the early stages of digital adoption, with the introduction of technologies like computers for administrative tasks and the utilisation of CD-ROMs for multimedia exhibitions and educational content, as seen in projects like the Getty Museum’s “Art on CD-ROM”. As the 2000s progressed, museums embraced digital expansion with the rapid advancement of technology. Online collection databases became more prevalent, enabling remote access to artworks, and interactive exhibits incorporating touch screens and multimedia elements gained popularity. Initiatives like the Smithsonian 3D Digitisation project pioneered the use of 3D scanning technology for artefact preservation. Throughout the 2010s, there was a significant shift towards digital integration, characterised by greater emphasis on digitisation efforts for enhanced accessibility and preservation of cultural heritage. Mobile apps offering augmented reality experiences and social media engagement became commonplace, and open access initiatives, such as the British Library’s “Mechanical Curator” project, facilitated broader public access to museum collections. In the 2020s, museums witnessed a digital transformation brought on by advancements in technologies like artificial intelligence and virtual reality. They adapted to global events such as the COVID-19 pandemic by expanding online learning resources and virtual programming, exemplified by initiatives like MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) Learning Online. Museum websites and digital platforms developed, integrating features like data analytics to tailor digital experiences and improve engagement, as demonstrated by the V&A Museum’s redesigned website with personalised recommendations and intuitive navigation. This timeline underscores the continuous evolution of museums from analogue to digital realms, emphasising the growing importance of digital technologies in preserving and presenting cultural heritage to diverse audiences.

The boundaries of A David Bomberg Legacy – The Sarah Rose Collection afford an opportunity to test modes of digital curation and user interaction. The collection archive is made up of work deeded to London South Bank University in 2008 by the collector Sarah Rose. In the original deed for the collection, paintings and drawings by David Bomberg, Dennis Creffield, Cliff Holden, Thomas Holden, Edna Mann, Dorothy Mead, and Miles Peter Richmond were included. The original deed stipulated that the collection be digitally photographed for the purpose of conservation, reproduction, and documentation. Throughout the history of the collection at the university, photographs of the selected artists and artworks, scanned private view invites, and exhibition flyers have been added to a shared drive. The total number of digitised objects is in the hundreds. These digital objects have not been divided into hierarchical structures and institutional silos inherent to larger institutions with millions of digitised objects spread among different departments. The contents of the digital drive that have been amassed since 2008 are the focus of the curatorial concern of this project.

Access to the Sarah Rose collection has long been an issue, with visitors limited to viewing the gallery’s annual exhibition or even less frequently during the COVID-19 pandemic. During most of this project, access to the collection was by invitation only and was limited to people studying the collection. The online collection was conceived as a solution to this access problem, but my approach took it a step further. It wasn’t just about providing digital reproductions for viewing; it was about engaging with the collection as part of a larger network. The concept of networked images offers several affordances that enhance this engagement. Networked images are easily accessible to a global audience, allowing for widespread distribution and sharing across various platforms. Users can interact with these images through likes, comments, shares, and edits, fostering a participatory culture and enhancing engagement. The images can be linked to other digital content, creating a web of interconnected information that enriches the viewing experience. Algorithms can tailor the presentation of networked images to individual users’ preferences, enhancing relevance and personal connection to the content (Cox et al., 2021). This raises broader questions about digital access and its implications beyond simply searching for images. This involvement in digital collections expands the circulation of the digitised collection beyond the confines of traditional museum logic and taxonomy (Dekker, Annet et al., 2024b) It doesn’t restrict how the images can be searched, copied, or utilised online; it allows them to exist in a more expansive manner. By enabling interactivity, hyperconnectivity, and collaboration, the online platform shifts the static collection into a living, growing entity. This temporal and spatial flexibility break traditional constraints, fostering a more inclusive and engaging experience for all users.

The original collection deed stipulated that no new work could be added to the collection. The digital archive does not have an official collection policy; images and documents were saved and added at the discretion of the curators and gallery assistants who had access to the shared drive. The collection is uniquely bounded but still bears the traces of varied voices with diverse approaches to classification – what was deemed worth saving and preferred formats of digitisation. The technical structure of the digital archive determines the structure of what digital content could be archived and its relationship to the future. The shared drive and file formats shape what has been saved and what future users can read. The trace of past curators’ choices to save or omit documents and images in the gallery’s shared files has produced its own archive (Derrida and Prenowitz, 1996) These decisions shape the digitised collection of material to be curated.

The project aims to critically reflect on the online curation process and test new tools for digital collection outreach and curation. The specific research questions revolve around the implications of curating online, particularly within the context of this unique collection. In this project I will examine the role of the curator/collaborator at the site of interpretation or mediation of the digital images to look at the possibilities and problematisations that arise as the image travels further away from the contextualising framework of the museum. I will explore how the role of the user and curator have shifted to examine what new approaches might be applied to the online engagement with the digital networks of digital objects in the Borough Road Archive Collection. By addressing the material qualities of the online collection elements and the new environment that they exist on beyond the boundaries of the museum we can potentially enhance user involvement, foster curiosity, and encourage a deeper exploration of the collection. Key aspects include exploring modes of digital curation, user interaction and traces of the user across the digital archive. The absence of an official collection policy for the digital archive offers an opportunity to explore the ambiguous classification and curation of digital objects connected to and expanding from the offline collection. The overarching research question revolves around understanding the dynamics of online curation within the constraints and opportunities presented by the A David Bomberg Legacy – The Sarah Rose Collection.

During my tenure as curator of the collection I have commissioned around 15 contemporary artists over a five-year period to create works that respond to the digital collection and archive. The status of the commissioned work is somewhat ambiguous, and they sit outside of the original deed; some pieces have been accessioned into the university collection and some sit in the online sites as sketches or blogs that could be lost in an update. The largely digital projects play with the themes of the format of the digital image, classification of the work, and suggested new ways for the digital work to be consumed. The digital commissions, exhibitions and performance documentation are now part of the digital archive but have a more ambivalent position, stored on local devices, displayed online and have not yet been folded into any cataloguing system. The parameters of the current deed preclude the digital work from being included into the Sarah Rose collection and so have formed another collection extending from and layering over the offline work. The commissioned projects frequently utilised a hybrid approach created with the aim to be seen through and with digital platforms with online and offline lives. Artists used the medium and tools of the Internet – the time scale of a GIF, the format of an online quiz to produce new work – to explore a new dimension of the offline collection. In this research I have selected some of the commissioned digital projects that informed how the research project was developed. These digital works include games Naming with Care [Ref 1] and Which Modern British Artist are You [Ref 2]?

The online works commissioned, and the digital files edited, differ significantly from the offline collection. Unlike the physical artefacts preserved in the offline collection, what is being archived online is not the original singular artefact but a modified version of it, as noted by (Kallinikos et al., 2010). This digital collection represents a parallel stream of curated content, expanding the scope of what can be curated and broadening the platforms through which this expanding collection of digital objects can be accessed and experienced. This project is an investigation of the shift between the use of a collection and archive in a specific offline space to an exploration of what happens when the digitised works are diffused into an expanded networked system. This networked system refers to the interconnected digital platforms including social media channels, cloud-based storage, collaborative tools, and other online environments where digitised collections can be accessed, shared, and interacted with by a global audience. This research examines how various human and non-human actors (such as curators, digital platforms, software, and audiences) interact within this networked system, creating an ecosystem where digital artefacts acquire new meanings and uses. This investigation is important because it sheds light on the impact of the digital diffusion of museum collections on curatorial use and access. By understanding the context, we can adapt museum curatorial practices and strategies to utilise digital resources for a wider engagement in innovative ways.

The series of draft projects undertaken in my capacity as the online curator of the Borough Road Collection Archive stemmed from a desire to explore and experiment with the mutable nature of the online collection archive, leveraging various open- source tools and existing online platforms. These projects were motivated by the need to engage users in novel ways and to critically reflect on the possibilities and limitations of digital curation practices.

This research practise is at the nexus of museum studies, curatorial studies and media studies. The designed interface of a wiki archival intervention proposes a way in which users could generate speculative, participatory interpretations of the circulating digital image. Without the constraints of wall space or catalogue paragraphs that dictate a singular interpretation of image the gamed intervention proposes a “making-with” relationship between the curator/user and digital images. The digitisation of museum objects and archives enable modes of action to think and act beyond the possibilities of physical exhibition-making.

In my role as the online curator of the Borough Road Collection Archive I used a variety of open-source tools and existing online platforms, such as a website, Twine to create an online game, and social media platforms including Instagram, to engage users with the mutable quality of the online collection archive. This practice of experimenting with the form of the digital image and its potential networked relationships began before the start of my research practise. These early drafts, produced as the digital curator of the collection, shaped the eventual form of my research practise and laid the groundwork for the curatorial method that I adapted as I shifted to my role of practitioner/researcher.

One early project mixed a game-like setup with open-source technology. In this project I began to think of how users might interact with the online collection beyond scrolling through the images on the site. Borrowing from the language and format of online quizzes I created a short game. The game was made in Twine, an open- source tool for telling interactive, non-linear stories. The game was called “Which Modern British Art Are You?” [See Ref 2]. Users could pick different options such as preferred medium, or art school and art theory to find which Modern British artist they are most closely aligned with. All the final answers were female Modern British artists. Whatever artist the user landed on, the final click through leads the user to the Wikipedia profile of the artist. Using Wikipedia profiles as the end point for the game led to the discovery that many of the entries for female Modern British artists were stub entries, or short entries. These incomplete descriptions of the Modern British female artists on Wikipedia were limited in both biographical information and the number of hyperlinks leading interested readers to any connected schools, locations, or influences. The draft of the game and use of Wikipedia entries illuminated the ways in which information about the collection and the network of related artists were being discovered and the limitations of those resources online. This project was an attempt to experiment with an open-source online tool (Twine) and imitate a popular form of interaction on the Internet (the online quiz) to lead users to possibly discover under-researched and less well-known Modern female British artists.

This led to an effort to expand the entries for female Modern British artists and to help users understand how these entries are made and connected to one another. I organised a Wikipedia Editathon with Wikipedia. This was an in-person event at the Borough Road Gallery, with a Wikipedian, a volunteer from Wikipedia, and resources such as catalogues, surveys, private view flyers and documentation from the gallery archive. People were invited into a physical space to edit and change online content and to watch those changes happen in real time. Participants were recruited through social media channels and internally on LSBU message boards and newsletters. In addition to learning about the selected artists, collaborators considered how Wikipedia operates. They reflected on how edits are verified, how you might annotate entries and what sort of networks and narratives they were building by linking to other artists, institutions, and places. Users could see in real time what networks these pages circulated within and how that might be altered through their own editing and annotating process. The intention of the Wikipedia workshop was to encourage users to engage with the passage of time on the Internet and the process of altering a record, thereby altering their relationship with the object. The process of generating Wikipedia entries underscored the creation of museum records, and helped create insights into how institutions might tell the story of their objects and link them to other items in their collection. This workshop facilitated a critical examination of the object’s identity and its emergent nature within digital spaces.

Through these draft projects, I aimed to lay the groundwork for my research by exploring the intersection of digital curation, user engagement, and online platforms. Each project served as method for investigating the conditions of digital archives and their impact on audience interaction and understanding.

The draft projects served as a series of experimentations with the form of the online collection and potential methods of interaction with users. One limitation of the draft projects is that they were a series of discrete projects that were not part of a larger framework. Each new project necessitated building a new audience on a new platform. Users may have read a blog entry about the Wikipedia workshop or have finished the Which Modern British Artist are You? quiz but there was no space for an ongoing conversation. The process of doing these early experiments, trying to engage users with the materiality of the digital collection objects, had implications for the form of the research practise, the platforms that I later chose to work with and my approach to online curation.

1.2 Art object digitisation

The digitisation of A David Bomberg Legacy – The Sarah Rose Collection provided an opportunity to explore the digital collection and archives in the shifting landscape of museum practices and digital technologies. The collection was digitised between September 2011 and February 2012 as part of the Heritage Lottery Fund grant given to the collection. Once digitised the collection was put on the collection website and the digital images of the oil and acrylic paintings were made available to view through the Public Catalogues Foundation and BBC ‘Your Paintings’ website. The expansion of museum collections into the digital realm marks a significant departure from traditional analogue methods, ushering in a new era of accessibility and engagement. My work with the Sarah Rose Collection, both physical and digital, has provided a unique vantage point to observe this transition. The digital archive, originally intended for documentation purposes, has transformed into a dynamic space for curation and interaction. Through experimentation with open-source tools and online platforms, I began to survey the mutable nature of the online collection and its potential for audience engagement.

In this digital ecosystem, museums must adapt to the new user roles brought on by digitisation, where visitors play an active role in altering the physical assets into digital resources. This shift blurs the boundaries between institutional authority and user agency, presenting new challenges and opportunities for museums to navigate. As museums engage with the mass digitisation of their collections and archives and the effect that has on user participation, we must confront complex questions about what these objects are and their place in the institutional structure. By critically examining these dynamics, we can develop innovative strategies for digital curation and engagement.

The digital museum object could be considered as the documentation of a physical object (Müller, 2010) Documentation focuses on recording information about objects in a digital museum collection; representation involves presenting and interpreting those objects in engaging ways for audiences. Together, documentation and representation contribute to the accessibility, interpretation, and appreciation of cultural heritage in the digital realm. Documentation was the original motivation in digitising the works in the collection. This research practise considers an expanded understanding of the digital object beyond a representation of a physical offline artefact. The digital image is still a material object. The images are stored in code, accessed through an interface and are products of hardware (Lister et al., 2009). The digital image is not just a representation, technology, or object, but the nexus of a combination of technologies, meanings, uses and practices (Gómez Cruz and Meyer, 2012). Digital images are also editable, can be easily reproduced and circulated and accessed at any time (Steyerl, 2012) These characteristics result in the ability of an image to be embedded in new environments outside of the context of the art institution. By reframing the digitised image as more than the documentation of the offline collection, the emergent qualities and possibilities become more evident. Digital images are material objects with the potential to be edited, circulated, and can move through networked environments. Digital images in the museum context serve as both documentation tools and representations of cultural heritage. They enable museums to document, represent, and circulate their collections within networked environments, expanding access and fostering engagement with diverse audiences.

In this research practise the term “digital object” is used to designate different forms of digital files that are open for online curation. It should be noted that in using the term “digital object” there is a flattening out of the technical structure that we, as users, are interacting with. The digital object is not a stable image/object but a mutable, programmable view of a database that is constantly updating (Hoelzl and Marie, 2015). The digital image is a term used throughout the research to describe the emerging connections between data, images, screens, and networks; it is not a solid or static image object. The digital images can be understood as operative in the sense that they do not function as images alone but can also serve as part of an operation used for and by machines (Farocki, 2004) The digital objects described here are one possible combination of the relationships between this network of relations.

In addition to the digital objects that form the online archive collection the digital world also encompassed the tools that these objects operate in, including the software or hardware, and out into the cultural context in which the art institution exists (Sejul Malde et al., 2019) The use of the term digital object across this research practise is a description of a dynamic and changing relationship between what we interact with and the systems and culture it exists within.

It is not only museums digitising their own collections but visitors that can modify the museum’s physical assets into digital assets that can then be uploaded and shared. Museums must adapt to the idea of their collections not being seen as a storehouse of precious objects but as a site of possible creation of image files that can be uploaded and exchanged outside of the institutional context (Pepi, 2014) They must adapt because the digital images now participate in a broader network, beyond the framing of the museum’s institutional framing and narratives. The control over what is digitised and how it is presented and circulated is no longer solely vested in the institutions holding the physical objects. Thus, museums are compelled to adapt to this new reality, where the boundaries between institutional authority and user agency become blurred, and where the dissemination and interpretation of digitised collections extend far beyond the traditional confines of the museum. Institutional practices are still embedded in what and how collections are digitised, processes like organising archives and tagged, deciding what to preserve digitally, and managing access to digital material. Digitisation of collections and archives are shaped by technical and ideological factors. This research practice contributes to the reframing of the curatorial role to address the emergence of this new paradigm of what can be curated. Mass digitisation of collections and archives creates emerging complex relationships that involve technical, cultural, and political dimensions that raise new challenges, such as information organisation and the commodification of user data (Thylstrup, 2018). The digitisation of collections and the user’s own participation in this process can open up a network of complex relationships between the institution, the platforms, and the users.

In the museum context, objects serve specific functions such as preservation, understanding, recording, and representation of collections. However, outside the museum, these same objects can take on new roles as forms of knowledge that contribute to ongoing exchanges within different relational structures shaped by users and viewers (Hogsden and Poulter, 2012) Despite their cultural importance, traditional museums face limitations imposed by hierarchical structures, which restrict interpretation and contextualisation, as well as constraints related to exhibition space and conservation needs. Online curation of art objects offers an opportunity to overcome these limitations by potentially reconstituting lost contexts, meanings, and relationships across diverse cultural territories.

The digital museum object encompasses both documentation and representation, serving as a pivotal tool in the accessibility, interpretation, and appreciation of cultural heritage within digital environments. Originally motivated by documentation, the digitisation process can allow a museum to embrace a broader understanding of digital objects, acknowledging their materiality. As such, digital images transcend representations, embodying a nexus of technologies, meanings, and practices. By applying insights from material culture studies, we can view every object as a layered entity encompassing material, social, political, and epistemological dimensions. Examining digital objects through this lens allows us to grasp how digital media actively engages in both mimicking and constructing narratives about the real world within the museum context (Geismar, Haidy, 2018). Digital objects possess the unique capability to be edited, reproduced, and circulated across networked environments, thereby extending beyond the confines of the traditional museum context. With museums and visitors alike contributing to the digitisation process, collections become dynamic assets, fostering complex relationships between institutions, platforms, and users. In this rapidly shifting ecosystem museums are compelled to adapt, recognising the blurring boundaries between institutional authority and user agency. As digitisation shapes new paradigms in the cultural sector, the challenges and opportunities presented by mass digitisation underscore the need for ongoing reflection and adaptation in museum practices. Through the interplay of technical, cultural, and political dimensions, digitisation opens pathways to enhanced access, engagement, and understanding of cultural heritage for diverse audiences.

1.3 Curation and digitisation

As digital curation reshapes the presentation and engagement with cultural heritage, the role of the curator is undergoing profound changes. Originally tasked with caretaking collections, curators now navigate a complex web of roles and responsibilities in the digital realm. While the traditional museum context emphasises coherent narratives and interpretative frameworks, digital platforms prioritise the users’ ability to access and interact with the digital artefacts. This divergence highlights a shift in focus, as curators engage with digital objects that extend beyond the confines of institutional control. In this context, digital curation emerges as a collaborative endeavour, involving a diverse array of users and platforms in the creation and dissemination of meaning. As the boundaries between custodial environments and digital platforms blur, museums are challenged to adapt their practices to accommodate this new paradigm. Through ongoing reflection and adaptation, museums can engage with the process of digitisation to enhance access, engagement, and facilitate the understanding of cultural heritage for diverse audiences.

The museum contextualises its collections through research, educational programmes, and exhibitions. The role of the museum curator is to produce and communicate coherent narratives that make sense of the collected objects. This purpose is in contrast with the logic of the databases that digitised collections are uploaded to. Databases forgo narrative in favour of ordered, efficient, end-user retrieval (Pepi, 2014) The purpose of those who collect and maintain museum collections, including curators, might be to operate with a different set of concerns than other staff members, who are charged with the digitisation and organisation of the online objects. Within the broad spectrum of museum roles, while the curator primarily oversees collections and exhibitions, all members of the museum staff contribute to the curation of the institution (Lopes, 2020). In this growing landscape of museum practices, the curator’s role in crafting coherent narratives to (Lopes, 2020) contextualise collections stands in contrast to the efficiency-driven logic of digital databases. While curators focus on creating connections and interpretations within physical spaces, the digitisation and organisation of online objects present a different set of concerns. The task of interpreting the digital collection sits not just with the role of the curator but within the broader scope of museum operations. All staff members contribute to curating the museum experience, reflecting the multifaceted nature of contemporary museum stewardship.

The role of curator has expanded to encompass a wide breadth of activities and responsibilities. Starting from the role of curators as caretakers of collections (George, 2015) the role has grown more complex and area specific. As institutions and artwork continue to become more conceptual and referential the curator’s role has extended from the keeper of objects to a specialised connoisseur and interpreter of objects’ meanings. Both the volume of artwork and the need for contextualisation of conceptual art movements (Balzer, 2015) demand further information for the viewer to understand the work and context. Curating involves the assembly of elements that include artworks, information, individuals, contexts, and resources that have not been connected before. The curatorial represents the shifting environment where this process unfolds (Rogoff, 2012) In my role as the digital curator and researcher my focus has been to inform the user of the context of the artwork in art history and engage them as users with the online material. A core concept of curating lies in recognising the possibilities within social interactions and harnessing them to foster collective cultural expressions. At its core, curation is about communication; it is about bringing things into existence through dialogue. Beyond exhibitions or events, it i's about nurturing the social connections that give rise to these expressions, by establishing and maintaining channels of communication among all involved parties (Verwoert, 2010).The point of access and interaction has shifted beyond the museum context.

Digital curation can refer to the preservation of digital material to safeguard accessibility over the long-term (Abbott, 2008) In this new context the idea of curator as host is also present. In an online collection and archive, there is the ability to create a new set of meanings generated by users and placed in different contexts, decoupled from institutionally given meaning and context. What does it mean to facilitate interaction for users using works that are no longer in the museum’s control? The freedom of movement of digital objects and liberation from the museum’s interpretative framework could add new meaning and depth to a new set of users but also be a loss — an abstraction from the complexity and richness of use and legibility that can no longer be traced (Sekula, 2003. )Facilitating interaction with digital objects that have transcended the museum’s control presents a complex dilemma. While this freedom allows for new interpretations and engagements by users, it also raises questions about the loss of institutional context and the potential abstraction of meaning. Without the museum’s interpretative framework, digital objects may lack the richness of historical and contextual information, potentially leading to a loss of understanding and appreciation of their significance. While liberation from institutional constraints offers opportunities for exploration and reimagining, it also necessitates careful consideration of how to preserve and convey the complexity and richness of these digital artefacts in their new context. Although there is potential for loss there is also an opportunity for the digitised objects to be understood in novel contexts and to allow new knowledges into a formerly bounded space. This research practise will examine the possibility that digital objects can be understood in terms of their performativity, movement, and potentiality that make them operative far beyond the boundaries of art institutions (Were, 2014) In navigating the realm of digital curation, the role of the curator as a caretaker extends to the interaction that might generate new meanings for users within a digital habitat. While the liberation of digital objects from institutional constraints may entail a loss of traditional contexts, it also opens avenues for novel interpretations and engagements. Embracing this shift requires a re-evaluation of what it means to care for works that transcend traditional boundaries, inviting exploration into their performativity, movement, and potentiality beyond the confines of art institutions.

This research practise views digital curation as a practice performed by a mixture of users including researchers, artists, users, and platforms, on mutable objects, extending past the curation lifecycle determined by the custodial environment (Dallas, 2015). In this view, digital curation is not solely the responsibility of institutional curators but is instead a collaborative and ongoing practice involving various actors. These actors include not only institutional researchers and curators but also artists, general users, and even the platforms themselves that host digital content. While custodial environments typically impose specific timelines or frameworks for curation, digital curation extends beyond these constraints. It implies a more fluid and decentralised approach to managing and curating digital content, where the lifecycle of curation is not dictated solely by institutional protocols but by the ongoing interactions and interventions of diverse stakeholders within digital spaces. Reaching beyond a custodial view, this research practise aims to engage with the concept of digital curation as a field of intellectual inquiry and into forms of co-inquiry facilitated by the potentialities of the digital object. Digital curation is a term sometimes used interchangeably with digital archiving and the distinction between the two should be made clear: digital archiving is one form of digital curation (Cunningham, 2008) The purview of this research practise is not the digital curation in the sense that it mirrors archiving standards but in digital archiving in the sense of how objects are organised and made sense of.