Copy-Digitise-Restore?

Gilbert & George, Gordon's makes us drunk, 1972

The preservation and restoration of videos is becoming ever more important, for television broadcasters and distributors, and also for restorers, art historians and artists. There are "quick" solutions when handling the material where unfortunately the loss of the artistic intention is not the only casualty. What kind of solutions are practical here? The complexity of video installations poses many questions relating to the compilation of a work in its artistic and technical entirety, where the individual components may depend extremely on one another.

Douglas Davis, Video against video, 1975

The  symposium of the Eexpert group "el_media" in the  association of restorers (VDR) holds talks with speakers who in recent years have endeavoured to find solutions and have already come up with some practical ideas. Proposals regarding the fundamental ethical questions and possibilities to recognise damage and conservation using examples of various archiving, documentation and restoration methods from Switzerland, the Netherlands, America and Germany are presented and discussed. Simultaneous translation and refreshment is provided.