Preservation and Presentation of Installation Art

Hirschhorn, Thomas

Doppelgarage

1. Research questions
2. Installing the artwork
3. Inventory and photo documentation
4. Geodetic measurement
5. Dismantling and storage
6. Conservation issues

information on geodetic measurement of installation art

4. Geodetic measurement (April 2007)
contributor(s) Maike Grün (conservator)
contributors: Thomas Weber and Thomas Schäfer (surveyors, Technical University Munich, Chair of Geodesy, Univ.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Th. Wunderlich)

Thomas Hirschhorn’s ‘Doppelgarage’ is composed of nearly four hundred objects arranged over an area of some 120 square metres. The ordering and positioning of the individual objects are integral to the artistic statement the environment is designed to deliver. This is why reliable documentation is essential – particularly for exhibitions many years hence. Drawings, photographs and video clips are only of limited use in identifying the precise location of an object because they are subject to a margin of interpretation. For these reasons, installation artworks held in the Pinakothek der Moderne’s contemporary art collection have been subject to geodetic measurement in recent years. Every object in these artworks thus has precise coordinates. Among other things, these data are used to develop floor plans and plan views.

A combination of laser scanning, photogrammetry and tacheometry was used to measure the complex geometry of the environment.

See ’external links’ or ‘Research > documentation > The measurement of installation art’ for information about the geodetic measurement of installations and environments at the Pinakothek der Moderne.

PHOTO an expert from the Technical University Munich taking measurements of Hirschhorn’s environment with a laser scanner in March 2005 (Maike Grün © VG Bild-Kunst Bonn, 2007)