The most radical preservation strategy is to reinterpret the work each time it is re-created. To reinterpret a Dan Flavin light installation would mean to ask what contemporary medium would have the metaphoric value of fluorescent light in the 1960s. Reinterpretation is a dangerous technique when not warranted by the artist, but it may be the only way to re-create performed, installed, or networked art designed to vary with context.
Variable Media Initiative - Glossary, p. 130-137
The most radical preservation strategy is to reinterpret the work each time it is re-created. To reinterpret a Dan Flavin light installation would mean to ask what contemporary medium would have the metaphoric value of fluorescent light in the 1960s. Reinterpretation is a dangerous technique when not warranted by the artist, but it may be the only way to re-create performed, installed, or networked art designed to vary with context.
Variable Media Initiative - Glossary, p. 130-137
In some case reinterpretation of a piece using other than its original material components might be the best way to preserve its 'heart'.[…] A challenge to the idea of reinterpretation and change, if it should be decided that such change is allowable or desirable, is that, unlike theater and music, an installation rarely has a text or score that can be safely regarded as the objective starting point for any subsequent re-creation. This situation presents a philosophical problem for museums, collectors, curators, artists and conservators that appear to have no easy solution (q) and can be considered only on a case-by-case basis.
Real, 2001, p.214 - 216
