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Thirtieth International Congress of the History of Art Art History for the Millenium: Time. Section 23 Digital Art History Time London, 3-8 September 2000 |
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Alicia Haber <ahaber@netgate.com.uy>, Director MUVA Virtual Museum of Arts El Pais, Leyenda Patria 3104 ap 502, 11300 Montevideo, Uruguay.
© each author has full responsibility in owning copyright on the texts and on the images they publish on this website
MUVA was launched on May 20, 1997. It is the biggest and most important web-site in Uruguay and the country's first virtual museum. It is devoted to Uruguayan art so far and it intends to devote also to Latin American Art in the future. The rationale for the creation of a virtual museum in Uruguay is very much related to the situation of art in the country and its social and cultural characteristics and not only to the impact of Internet as a new medium.
THE ART SCENE IN URUGUAY: LIMITATIONS AND PROBLEMS : Visual arts are very important in Uruguayan cultural life. In this respect, both national and international experts judge art production to be one of the county's most outstanding characteristics. Furthermore, Uruguayan art is relevant on the Latin American art scene. Nevertheless, the country's art scene faces all kinds of problems linked to its socio-economic situation and there are many factors hindering its visibility.
Exhibitions, museums and art centers are not in a good situation and there is a big difference between Uruguay and the developed countries in this respect. There is a gap between the level of creation, the abundant consumption of culture, the high level of attendance to exhibitions and the budget devoted to museums and collections. There is also a gap between the level of quality and the fertile production of art, the enormous quantity of artists in relation to the population and the very low level of investment in museums, collections, purchase of art and a policy of art in public spaces. There is a contrast between the general situation of Uruguay and the circumstances under which the art scene develops.
There are no first class museums and no first class buildings to house them. No museum has ever been built for that specific purpose. Museums are generally old, refurbished buildings and most of them are not in good shape. Collections are poor, almost uniquely devoted to Uruguayan art and even then, very incomplete. Likewise, there are no museums for crafts, design, photography and video art and no specific collections in these areas in any museum. The paradox is that the Uruguayan production in those areas is very strong. Most of the museums are devoted to painting, sculpture, drawing, and prints. Furthermore, permanent collections do not have much space to be exhibited.
On the other side there are very few private museums, they are small, housed in recycled building and in many cases the situation is not particularly favorable. Concerning art centers, the situation is not much better.
Funds for art, museums and art centers are insufficient because the country has undergone a prolonged crisis lasting over 30 years from which it was recovering slowly and sadly in the last two years is suffering one of the worst economic crisis of its history with 15% unemployment and a drastic reduction in private and public expenses. There was a period of improvement that has been stopped in the last two years. But even when it recovers the country has first order priorities such as health and education and is facing the problems involved in recovering stability and in solving long-term issues. In this context, art has not been a priority so far.
Unfortunately, there is almost no tradition of private support to the arts. Uruguay has a tradition of wide social and cultural services provided by the government. In the cultural and artistic area, there are few private efforts and no incentives such as a tax deduction policy.
In Uruguay most museums are seen to be very rigid institutions, tied with bureaucracy; marketing or communication practices which are very common in countries like USA or UK, do not exist.
THE ORIGIN OF THE PROJECT: The creation of MUVA a 100% virtual museum that has no counterpart in reality, is in part related to the frustrations and limitations stemming from certain socio-economic realities and to the constraints of the Uruguayan society. Artists, architects, curators, museum directors fight and suffer but now this virtual experience, in a sense, might help them and offer new ways of satisfaction. Many constraints disappear in Cyberspace.
Virtual museums can be much faster than their real counterparts; there is no bureaucracy and they do not have to face the enormous cost of "real museums" so if we keep the project cost efficient an dream, in a sense, can become true.
By the time I was preparing my project back in 1996 I had no idea of what later became an issue : "deinstitutionalizing," the practice of abandoning a physical space for a virtual one has come to be known in the culture world, expanding into cyberspace, a choice eventually created by problems in the real world similar to the ones I was facing in Uruguay such as an institution's financial situation. Others even in First World Countries or in rich societies have discovered that operating from the Web can also be a solution and have turned to the Internet as Martha Wilson did, founding director of the pioneering Franklin Furnace performance-art venue.
Wilson sold her organization's TriBeCa loft space and relocated to the Web in 1998.. The Alternative Museum in New York launched its site this year (2000) on the Web, where it will display Net interactive art and reproductions of digitally created images, as well as "virtually curated" exhibits made in traditional media. The museum closed its space in SoHo, in January and has no plans so far to reopen in a real-world location.
MUVA is not a website to present and to represent a museum that exists or existed previoulsy, neither is it the extension of the communication possibilities offered by the museum. An the definition by the International Council of Museums only applies in part: "a museum is a non-profit making, permanent institution in the service of society and of its development, and open to the public which acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits, for purposes of study, education and enjoyment, material evidence of people and their environment" (ICOM statutes, article 2) . MUVA is no-profit, permanent, open to the public, but does not conserve and does not give material evidence neither gives "real" access to the items. What it give is virtual possibility to have access to the information about these objects.
In the meantime the concepts about museums have changed. Museums no longer necessarily have walls and are no longer only repositories, but they can also be on line information resources, forum of discourse, useful for research, dissemination of knowledge.
Museums, are not anymore only about access to objects, or works of art, but access to information. "Virtual" museums are not necessarily institutional. It can be an online structure to make up for the lack of a physical museum because of scarcity of funding or a lack of interest from the State or patrons. My definition of virtual would be closer to "universal," meaning a museum of the possible. For the French philosopher Pierre Lévy, "the virtual, rigorously defined, has few affinities with the fake, the illusory or the imaginary. The virtual is not at all the opposite of the real. Quite the reverse, it is a rich and powerful mode of being, loosening creation processes up, opening futures, digging mines of meaning under the dullness of immediate physical presence."
A web museum as the advantage of being an interactive system where any art can be experienced by any person any time at any place since Internet is descentered and placeless., its is a deterritorialized institution, accessible via the Web, as Peter Weibel states in The Virtual Museion Beyond the White Cube: Any Art Any Time Any Place ". The main thesis is that the virtual museum in the internet is closer to the original idea of a museion, that is forum of discourse, collection of information (not objects), archive, research, knowledge, production, than the real museums built now. Especially the postmodern problem of any museum, its relation to the masses, which traditionally is resolved by sacrificing knowledge to the spectacle, can be handled in any way which does not humiliate the mass audience as mass, but treats each member of the masses as an individual. The challenges of the museum of the future are multifunctional variety, multidisciplinarity (all forms of art, science, technology), multimedia and multiculturality. This museum of multiple choice will be an interactive system where any art can be experienced by any person any time at any place since it is decentered, placeless. The first conception of such a virtual museum in the net was the portable museum of Marcel Duchamp (La Boite A Valise) The next step was Le Musée Imaginaire André Malraux (1974). Now the virtual museum in the net is the best model of a MMMMM (Multifunctional, Multidisciplinary, Multimedia, Multicultural Museum).
At the same time, the creation of MUVA is linked to the growth of Internet.. We tried to be on the Net as soon as we realized its potential so we started rather early. And now we know that we were not mistaken. The number of people who access the World Wide Web for entertainment, business, research, and education is growing daily.
The creation of MUVA is also linked with the local situation concerning PC use and Internet. In Ururuguay 26 % owns a PC, and 39% has access to a PC or other type of computer, this is the highest percentage in Latin America. Ther computers per inhabitantes, is the largest in Latin America, followed by Chile, Argentina, Brasil, Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela.
This is a very favorable time for a Web project in Uruguay. Internet itself is growing fast in the country and its consumption in Uruguay is growing dramatically. So to start with, there is a natural local audience for a virtual museum. Uruguay is one of the countries with the largest per capita consumption of Internet in Latin America and there are many sites. The rapid proliferation of Internet users in Uruguay is amazing, in the sense that it follows First World patterns. In 1996 1,9 % of the population was using Internet, in 1998 6,4% was using it, in 2000 17% is using it at home, 8% in the office, This is the highest percentage in the region. Following the patterns of other countries 61% belong to middle and high middle class.
Perhaps, to a certain extent and in certain circles, there is even more eagerness to use the medium in Uruguay because of an intense feeling of isolation of the Southern Cone from the centers of intellectual and cultural power.
Tele-densities in Uruguay is actually quite high . Uruguay is the only country in the Americas to have 100 percent digital telephone system. Internet development (measured in per capita Internet hosts) is highly correlated to economic development (measured as GNP). According to studies, the countries with the highest Internet penetration also have the highest GNP. But the case of Uruguay is different and does not follow the pattern. This fact was pointed out by Negroponte at a lecture at the Getty : "None of the 100 poorest countries in the world were in South America. You have a whole part of the world that speaks basically two languages.And what you find is that the tele-densities in those countries are actually quite high if you want a Trivial Pursuit or cocktail kind of question that nobody will ever get the answer to, it's, which is the only country in the Americas to have a purely 100 percent digital telephone system. And I mean there's not one analog switch--in our case, might be in Northern Maine someplace. And the answer is Uruguay. And one of the reasons you find these tele-densities that are starting to grow, , is that in many of those governments, people, particularly when it comes to education, are much more aggressive than we are. And they're much more aggressively partly because they realize that that is the asset.
These are some of the reasons for the creation of MUVA, a project that I began in 1996. I had been working for 20 years in the field of art history (as a teacher, as a researcher, as a critic and since 1988 in curatorial tasks). I was concerned over several issues and had been writing extensively about them and I wanted to try a new medium to give Uruguayan art more visibility. So the initiative to develop the museum web site was taken by me a professional art historian and curator and director and project director of the museum.
A web-museum will not solve the problems of Uruguayan art. Furthermore, the intention is neither to substitute reality nor to usurp contacts with real artworks (My dream, as a curator, art historian and as a Uruguayan is that we might have in the future a real state of the art museum in the country besides this virtual museum and others on the Net). This web-museum is an alternative medium to give more visibility to Uruguayan art and calm frustrations in an another realm - the virtual world ö possibly giving Uruguayan art a new place in the world. Because communication technology permits global sharing, MUVA is able to reveal some aspects of a human activity of a peripheral country and disseminate knowledge about it. In any case the objects being shown at MUVA could not otherwise be seen together and their is considerable barriers to their access. So MUVA is a digital surrogates and a way to enable access to privately held materials, make them available at least as information.
I am aware of the aura problems and that nothing substitutes de real contact and that by definition, and in the popular understanding of the word, museums are essentially about real objects. But this use of the Net is adding also to a gap, to the little knowledge of Latin American art and its regional differences. It might help fight prejudices and general sterotypes.
THE PATRONAGE OF THE NEWSPAPER EL PAIS
I wanted to create the virtual museum as soon as possible but, knowing the difficulties the country was undergoing, the slow motion of change following a long period of crisis, I was concerned over red tape issues and bureaucracy. Likewise, I was aware that the financial situation of the University of the Republic (the most important in the country) would not allow it to create such a project yet. Therefore, I approached a sponsor, El Pa's the most important newspaper in Uruguay. The project was accepted, backed and since then MUVA belongs to El Pa's.
The newspaper has the right profile for this sponsorship. It created its own very successful Web-site and the digital version of the newspaper in March 1996 http://www.diarioelpais.com (a prize-winning edition), it has a Digital Department and a Systems and Computer Department, the staff, the software and the hardware. Not only is El Pa's interested in digital experiences and Internet projects, but it also has a long history of patronage and of creating specific spaces for the arts. So basically was it had to do is pay more to the employees working there.. To build the site not immediately required to invest in any hardware or software The museum was offered free server space.
STAFF.
I did not have not have now enough training to develop a museum web site, nor did my tasks leave me time for the learning process an even then I would not have had acquired the sophisticated capacities my idea required.
I needed a staff of Uruguayans, that could make my dream come true in a low cost way and the purpose was to to everthing in Uruguay and not to hire an enterprise inside or outside Uruguay which would have been very costly. So the museum was finally possible thanks to a staff that was provided by the newpaper and the idea was backed by Guillermo Pérez Rossel General Coordinator of the Digital Projects Department. MUVA is possible to the creativity of a team in which the role of Mario Buchichio the graphic designer and the of Leonardo Setaro the webmaster are pivotal and for the general coordination I count on the editor Laszlo Erdélyi. The staff includes besides me architects, journalists, graphic designers, technicians, photographers, architects, two Masters in Physics and webmasters, one graphic and digital designer and experts in computer science and a translator. All of the bring their experience to this new enterprise. The requirements for the site were specified by me the curator and director and I was and am and remained content expert, and have a final say on all content.
Almost everybody already worked at the newspaper except for the translator , the webmaster and the ISP Internet Service Provider but they have been working for the digital edition so they were very much related to the newspaper and made a very good price for their work. Leonardo Setaro and Daniel Armand Ugon the owners of Web2Mil have previous experience that helps them solve this case entirely in Uruguay and without external help. Web2mil is an ISP Internet Service Provider, one of the first in Uruguay and by far the most powerful. It has become since 1996 a leader in Internet technology in Uruguay. It has its own server, the only 10 MBPS server in Uruguay. With the wide band, two servers, one in California and one in New York, (the one for MUVA in New York,) it allows MUVA to have many visitors.
This project and its making created other vary favorable situations. It stimulated interactions among individuals across disciplines that also results in innovation. A number of different craft skills and knowledges were and are involved from different areas that seldom work together in Uruguay, There were and there are constant cross- fertilization network relationships and stimulation that lead to both development and innovation . MUVA thus, became a source of innovation, experimentation, and dialogue among people with different background and capacities.
THE MUSEUM EXPERIENCE Taking into consideration the shortcomings of the Uruguayan art scene and the possibilities Internet has to offer, MUVA endeavors to display the best Uruguayan art in a virtual realm that gives a strong sensation of reality.
The idea is to use the Web as an exhibition medium that will recreate the museum experience and to mimic as far as possible the sensation of being inside a building. The guiding principle in this line of thought is the generation of virtual environments closely linked to reality. This museum is not a linear walk through a catalogue of images. When I started the project the majoriy of the museums on line were just pages presenting the institutional, showing some art and some information. and basically served as promotion of the real museum. So I decided to do something completly different because my needs and the need of my country and my objectives were different
THE BUILDING. When I surfed basically in 1996 doing my research for the creation of MUVA I found that the vast majority of them were very similar to each other in structure and content, serving basically as "virtual brochures" for real museums But my needs and ideas were different.
MUVA is located in a special building designed by architects, which could be built at any time. The rationale for the creation of MUVA's virtual building, is that the construction of an art museum such as the outstanding ones in the great metropolitan capitals of the world, would have cost from 50 to 100 million dollars, a prohibitive sum in the situation of Uruguay.
Thus, the progress in virtual reality and development of Internet has made a great adventure possible: the design of what today is an impossible museum for Uruguay and at least have it in a virtual form. For Uruguayans the creation of a virtual museum has some specific connotations. Four young architects were commissioned to prepare the plans for the building and they designed it with DataCAD. The architects Jaime Lores, Raœl Nazur, Daniel Colominas and Marcelo Mezzottoni of the firm of Mezzotoni-Scheck & Partners designed MUVA's structure and created a virtual building. They created a fine arts museum, consisting of galleries for permanent and temporary exhibitions, as well as spaces for informal shows, sculpture garden, restoration workshops, and administrative services areas. They worked as if they were going to build a real museum. The building area would be in the "real" space of 6000 square meters and its virtual location is the very heart of downtown Montevideo. The building has five main floors and three additional levels, spatially interconnected using multiple heights.
Another important idea behind the creation of the virtual building is the presentation of art in a spatial context in order to convey a sensation similar to the one experienced in a museum and enhance the visual contact with artworks. These ideas played a major role in the project.
Design and HTML The building, its galleries and hallways, its public spaces and archives have a virtual dimension emulating that "impossible" museum. Design programs and the designers' creativity make it possible to generate high-quality images. The architects' plans are the basis for the design of the museum, where elaborate textures of pixels in thousands of colors give shape to walls, stairways, windows, sidewalks, roofs, spots, and virtual lighting. It is a complex yet precise construction endeavor, making the museum's six floors and ground level entirely navigable and enabling visitors to feel as if they were in a "real"-virtual museum.
Based on the architectural project, the digital graphic designer Mario Buchichio took over the digital production of MUVA. He created the 3D version of the museum. His role was to turn the gray-walled skeleton provided by the architects into a virtual structure that would look like a real building and be credible to its visitors. He generated the structure, which was then trimmed and lit to house the Museum's art works. He took charge of the general decoration, the textures of the walls, the installation of floors and glass, the finishing of the stairways, the construction of the elevator and of the stairs. He had to work in a virtual building, because no photography was used as reference; he computer-generated everything. He always bore in mind ease of navigation so he avoided over heavy images.
A very important part of this construction process is the interaction with the physicist Leonardo Setaro, to ensure that the design would be compatible with the technique for navigating MUVA implemented by Web2mil. These realistic effects of 3D design are combined with a special use of HTML.
The team opted for HTML for many reasons. It wanted MUVA to be very accessible and to have very good graphic quality. It wanted the easiest navigation possible and opted for a navigation that would not require the downloading of software or plug-ins. In MUVA only a browser with no external applications is needed to enjoy a user-friendly museum.
One of the ideas is to convince the navigator to enter the virtual world of MUVA easily, forgetting about the PC and the browser. Thus MUVA encourages the user to visit the building, enter another reality, have a virtual sensation, live an illusion. The goal is to give the sensation of entering a virtual realm, forgetting about the normal commands and only use MUVA commands. The commands are intuitive and related to the normal movements of human beings. Thus, the commands relate to the sensation of advancing from one hall to the other, to being able to move around an exhibition hall, to go up and down the staircases, to travel up and down the elevators, to approach the information desk and to send messages. The users can rotate, advance and go back, looking at the 3D images that simulate 3D spaces and have to an extent the sensation of visiting a museum and enjoy its architecture and at the same time enjoy the works of art.
The intention at the same time is to keep things relatively fast. A user with a standard computer and a 28.8 KBPS modem connected to a good ISP can visit the halls quite fast. Each point of view is 26 Kbytes, and if the visitor decides on the eight points of view offered in each hall and a complete rotation, he or she can see the total hall with the rotations in 104 seconds. In 15 seconds, the visitor approaches the walls; zooms to the paintings and sculptures take 50 seconds. (Of course, the speed varies according to the ISP, the time of day, the country and the hardware used, so this process can be faster or slower).
MUVA tends to have accessibility and thus tries to be a user-friendly Net environment, able to present art on the web in the best way possible. The museum can be accessed with standard equipment and software and it does not have any special requirements, all browsers.. We decided to use Internet tools and be as sophisticated as possible but we do not want to be so far in the forefront that we get only to a few who have the tools.
Budget, Software and Hardware. One of the issues MUVA faces is its budget. We cannot overburden the newspaper, which is fully backing a very special project with no financial return, in a country where there is no tax deduction for sponsorship of cultural projects and there is not yet a very strong policy of on line advertising. We have to bear in mind that "El Pa's" is a newspaper and has other priorities. So MUVA has to use already existing human and equipment resources and in that sense, the budget is limited. Therefore, expensive hardware, software or external consulting are not used. In this project, there are no high tech computers, high-end or state of the art hardware and software such as that offered by Silicon Graphics. For instance, the designer uses a normal high potency PC Pentium, a clone of 120 Mega RAM and 6 Giga. His software is a 3D program, that is already two years old and only cost 1.500 dollars, while a more sophisticated one would have cost 7.000 dollars. And this software was not specially created to design a 3D building, so he has had to come up with procedures which, so to speak, he has to invent. MUVA is also able to use the scanner the newspaper owns, a Pixel Craft. Thus, more technical creativity is involved and fewer resources are used than would have been the case under more favorable conditions. We all aim at achieving the best results possible in a cost-effective way with very limited resources.
EXHIBITIONS AND CONTENTS MUVA specializes in one of the most significant contributions to Latin American Art: modern and contemporary Uruguayan art and, in the near future, it will open its doors to other examples of Latin American art. It offers the visitor the possibility of viewing on the home computer, quality representations of the best Uruguayan art and takes advantage of the Web and of a medium that is well suited to image-intensive exhibits of artworks.
MUVA seeks new opportunities for Uruguayan art and tries to give it more visibility. It offers a new venue for Uruguayan artists and wants to increase and improve opportunities for Uruguayan artists to enable them to come closer to the national and international art community. Thus, it fosters recognition of Uruguayan art.
The role envisioned for the virtual museum is to advocate, support and promote Uruguayan art and provide information on the subject. The idea is to disseminate knowledge about the country and make its resources and cultural heritage more accessible. We draw on new technology to achieve a wider diffusion and we use the web site is as publishing tool and as a showcase of our best examples of art.
MUVA is a content supplier and we give a lot of importance to information. At the same time, MUVA endeavors to decentralize culture. The Internet has traditionally been very US-centric. But the use of the network by other countries and cultures, like Uruguay, much encourages the entry of a diversity of voices into society.
We keep in mind that we take advantage of the "information society." to fulfill multiple roles in society, to show alternative social realities, such as the art of a peripheral small country, and add something to the multiple dimensions, provide programming content, entertain, and teach.
In the interim, it also tries to cover the needs of the Uruguayan Diaspora. It might well be a new source of syllabi for Latin American studies. MUVA hopes to encourage cultural diversity on the Net, and one of the goals we hope to achieve is to attract different profiles of visitors and increase the number of our viewers. MUVA also aims at attracting new audiences for art, for the "real" museums and collections and to stimulate them to enjoy "real" artworks
Openness. As the director and curator of MUVA, my goal is that it should make a broad spectrum of Uruguay's artistic creativity available. One my objectives is to exhibit all kinds of first class Uruguayan art. The museum is particularly pledged to Modern and Contemporary art and emphasizes its commitment to contemporary visual languages that receive scant attention in Uruguayan museums and is less known on the international scene. There is also a theoretical issue involved: MUVA endeavors to be open to change and innovation in the field of art.
It tries to cover the art of the masters, the highlights of Uruguayan art and, at the same time, mid-career art and that of cutting edge artists.
MUVA has openness to a variety of forms, styles and media. It displays prints, collages, paintings and an installation, sculptures, photography of different periods and styles: Modern, Contemporary, cutting edge. One of my ideas and one of MUVA's main characteristics is to make it possible to get to know little-explored, often almost inaccessible areas. It allows viewers to reach works in artists' studios and in private collections, ranging from the youngest artists to the masters.
In the process of the curatorial work and decisions that lie in my hands, I visit private collections and artist's studios, make the selection of the artworks that are more interesting and that are not exhibited frequently or that have never been exhibited. Then I write the texts, build the bibliography and write the biographies.
As a next step, the editor and the photographers go to the collections, take the pictures, which are then scanned. The photographers take care of the first stage of every movement in MUVA; they go to the homes of private collectors and to artists' studios to take the pictures of the paintings for the exhibitions. We inaugurate three or four exhibitions per year.
The discourse and practice of a museum. This task lies in my hands since I am the curator and art historian of the team. MUVA tries to maintain the discourse and practice of museum exhibition as regards classification, context, understanding of the viewers and reception.
I act as a normal curator, mounting exhibitions , offering interpretation, and various types of documentation such as informational labels, biography, bibliography . I am interested in, creating a visual experience that might give esthetic pleasure and cognitive rewards, self-education, enhancing the cognitive function.
Concerning information, a considerable amount has been put on line about the artists and the images. MUVA aims at creating a substantive commentary on the works and their historical and aesthetic context because we think that this is a very important characteristic of any good museum on the Web.
It includes the normal information given by museums regarding the works of art, (title, date, and size, technique, medium, and location) plus explanatory texts, texts about the historical and cultural context and references to schools, styles, or periods that the works of art represent. Biographies and bibliographies are also included. We also attempt to include personal statements by the artists, particularly in the case of young or cutting edge ones; I do not want to be an hegemonic curator. We also want to introduce the visitor to the image of the artist himself and his studio through photographs.
Content. We favor content and wish to balance the possibility of reaching a large number of viewers, while keeping in touch with a group more specialized in taste and knowledge. We do not want neglect one of the most interesting dimensions of Internet: the possibility of reaching enormous numbers of people globally. Furthermore, one of our goals is to attract more people to art, to art appreciation and to Uruguayan art in particular. Decisions become difficult regarding the intellectual level of the texts and this remains a matter of discussion among the team. Eventually we usually decide on a rather broad coverage, suitable for undergraduates and graduates and at the same time try to prepare messages that can also be enjoyed by a more general type of visitor. MUVA caters to different visitor profiles. We have considered the intellectual level or age-appropriateness of content and according to statistics the visitor is well educated and mature.
I am the content provider committed to give audiences relevant useful material actively promotes bilingual access, &endash;produce entirley in two languages
Authorship. Concerning the issue of authorship, MUVA is a provider of original content, written specially for it by a professional art historian whose biographical data is on line. We are aware of the difficulties of ascertaining the authority behind Web sites so we include all kinds of information. Anyone can check the credentials and verify the qualifications of the director and author of the texts and of the members of the team. In the event the visitor wishes to have more information, there is a permanent opportunity to communicate through e-mail, different pages provide the possibility to contact us and the team always answers the mail.
MUVA provides wide information on the museum itself in the section Info. Every detail is explained so the visitor has information about the purpose, the origin of the idea, the authorship, message from the director, resume of the director, message by the sponsor, the team, a help section, the history of the sponsor, links, awards, the virtual architecture, the browser required, etc
Interaction . We try to be very interactive to stimulate the navigator to make choices and ask questions .The navigator can communicate with us via e mail almost from every page, he or she can choose his or her own route. Following hypertext principles the pieces of information are linked and there are many possibilities of hypertextual navigation and cross references.
Copyright. In the matter of copyright, we are concerned over the unlawful appropriation of artist's images and the inadequate copyright laws applying to Internet. We do not scan from books, we take photographs of original artworks and have the permission of the artists or owners to photograph the works of art, scan them and reproduce them on line
THE ISSUE OF ON-LINE LITERACY: MUVA takes into consideration that there are varying degrees of on-line literacy. It has two help sections. One is quite lengthy and the other very practical, short and explicit. In the shorter Help section, navigation methods are clearly stated and easy to follow, explained and shown in detail and we endeavor that the museum should become a user-friendly site. In the longer version, many more details are explained in depth. We try to invite new users to feel comfortable with the new technologies and avoid alienating them.
There is a virtual office for messages through e-mail and at the end of almost every page there is also the e-mail address with an on-line connection, so we are continuously open to messages, which we always answer. In fact, we receive dozens of letters every day.
MUVA has a News section to keep the visitor informed about changes and has created a subscription form for a Newsletter (this is not ready yet). MUVA endeavors to have as many internal links as possible and it also offers off-site links.
ACCESSIBILITY FOR SPANISH SPEAKING AND NON-SPANISH SPEAKING VISITORS
The team decided to make the museum accessible to as vast an audience of viewers as possible. Therefore one month after the launching we duplicated the whole site in English. It is not an easy task for a virtual museum in a peripheral country to be visible. Internet is not exactly a cyber-democracy; English language sites are predominant, as is the presence of First World countries, particularly the United States. , 80% Web pagesn in English Therefore, we also have to cope with the hegemonic countries in the Web.
Multilingual sites get to a larger audience and might be used for different purposes, for example not only art bust the teaching of languages. Many of our visitors are learning Spanish. Our site is totally bilingual English / Spanish which adds more problems, work, costs and time of production is concerned.
We have visitors from Uruguay and many visitors are Uruguayans living abroad. According to e-mails received, hundreds of very nostalgic Uruguayans living abroad are eager to see Uruguayan art and discover new artists. The rest are visitors from all over the world. The fact that the site is also in English enables access by a great number of visitors from the USA several countries in Europe, Japan, Asia, in a total of 25 countries per day and around 60 per moth. The countries vary according to the days.
FEEDBACK AND VISIBILITY .The museum was presented to the public in a theater when it was inaugurated. It was important that this introduction took place in a real location for the visibility of Uruguayan and for to spread the information through the media, especially television, could take place.
For a relatively new virtual museum in a small country in the Southern Hemisphere and considering it belongs to a very peripheral culture, MUVA has already achieved considerable visibility without any budget for propaganda or image marketing.
Peer reviewed MUVA has been well received by many professionals in art education, art historians and museologist experts particularly in the area of web-museums and has received international awards from many European and American institutions since its inauguration on line on May 20, 1997, In Museums and the Web that took place in Toronto in April 1998, where major museums from all over the world were present MUVA got one of the six awards given by museologists to museums on line from all over the world.
Nominees and winners where chosen by experts dedicated to the creation, and the technical and professional development of web-museums. It was a juried competition and more than 155 museums on line entered the competition. MUVA won Best of the Web 1998 www.archimuse.com.
Case study: A collective digital enterprise : a Virtual Museum in a Third World Country.
By Alicia Haber, art historian, director, creator and project director of MUVA, Museo Virtual de Artes El Pais/Virtual Museum of Arts El País. URUGUAY
This paper deals with the issue of a collective digital enterprise that aims at being useful for teaching, learning, research and publication in the history of art. It addresses the role played by the art historian in a virtual museum, the problems arising from the usefulness of the site and the challenges of academic quality in this context.
It will focus on a case study of a virtual museum of Uruguay, MUVA Virtual Museum of Arts, created entirely and with a very small budget in a very small country of South America. Through this case study I can delve with the issues relating to the background of a webmaster of art history, to the usefulness of a site of this type particularly for a Third World Country, and to the internal organisation of a site related to art history. This case study is useful to analyse the problems and solutions faced by art history webmasters and might be useful for a comparative study with other sites.
It will explain the rationale beyond its creation and give concrete examples to discuss and analyse the way in which art history, curatorial work and digital expertise integrate in a complex way. The background and profession of its project director and the paper art history has in the creation, organisation and life of the museum since the beginning, will be one of the main issues.
MUVA, Museo Virtual de Artes El País, Virtual Museum of Arts El Pais http://www.diarioelpais.com/muva (Spanish) and http://www.diarioelpais.com/muva2 (English) was launched on May 20, 1997. It is the biggest and most important web-site in Uruguay and the country's first virtual museum. It is devoted to Uruguayan and Latin American Art, has 45 international awards and is visited by 25 countries per day from all over the world and has an average of 10.000 accesses per day.
This virtual museums exist only on the Net and it aims at being a social and educational instruments for solidifying culture and disseminate knowledge of Uruguayan art from an art history perspective. The role envisioned for the virtual museum is to advocate, support and promote Uruguayan art and art history and provide information on the subject to a national and international audience trough images and texts. The idea is to make cultural heritage and art history texts more accessible. Its intention is to become a new source of syllabi for Latin American studies and Latin American art
The museum favours content and wish to balance the possibility of reaching a large number of viewers, while keeping in touch with a group more specialised in taste and knowledge. It does not want to neglect one of the most interesting dimensions of Internet: the possibility of reaching enormous numbers of people globally. Furthermore, one of the goals is to attract more people to art, to art appreciation, to art history discourse and to Uruguayan art in particular.
At the same time, MUVA endeavours to decentralise culture. MUVA hopes to encourage cultural diversity on the Net through art history.
One of the goals we hope to achieve is to attract different profiles of visitors and increase the number of our viewers .This type environment addresses at the same time the global Internet public and the professional and scholarly audience. The museum tries to be accessible to as vast an audience of viewers as possible. Therefore the whole site is both in Spanish and English. It is not an easy task for a virtual museum in a peripheral country to be visible. Therefore, the museum has to cope with the hegemonic countries in the Web and present itself also in the lingua franca of English.
Although Internet represents a certain ideology, which is decentralisation, democratisation, and empowerment, and its inherent characteristics involve the undermining of power and monopolies, it was created in the United States and most of the sites are dominated by the presence's of USA and the problem is that peripheral but interesting cultures, sites, countries, do not get enough attention by American sites or First World countries. Internet is not exactly a cyber-democracy; English language sites are predominant, as is the presence of First World countries, particularly the United States. The Uruguayan museum encourages Internet to be more multicultural. The number of navigators, creators, webmaster, designers, artists, companies, clients etc etc from all over the world using Internet is growing and also the number of people speaking other languages than English or having other mentalities and things to offer that broadens the spectrum of culture and everyday life.
Therefore and after a three year experience we have an average 40% of visitors from Uruguay and many visitors are Uruguayans living abroad. According to e-mails received, hundreds of very nostalgic Uruguayans living abroad are eager to see Uruguayan art and discover new artists. The rest are visitors from all over the world. The fact that the site is also in English enables access by a great number of visitors from the USA - the second country registered as our visitor - several countries in Europe, Japan, Asia, in a total of 25 countries per day and around 60 per moth. The countries vary according to the days
The visitors has certain advantages on the Internet : they can see objects at home, in an appealing view, from a remote country. Moreover, since the Web is viewed as an entertainment medium the approach to learning is easier for many and they face serious matters in an relaxed atmosphere. So the virtual museum is attracting new types of audiences and people that would have never thought of reading about Uruguayan art. It is also attracting colleagues from different part of the world that are discovering Uruguayan art and getting in touch with an Uruguayan art historian and through me with other colleagues, bibliography and other data.
Concerning the issue of authorship, MUVA is a provider of original content, written specially for it by a professional art historian trained in the academic world, member of ICOM, CAA, AICA, CIMAM, ALAA, AHWA , authors of several books and monographs, teacher and with a 25 year of professional experience. My biographical data is on line. I am aware of the difficulties of ascertaining the authority behind Web sites so we include all kinds of information. Anyone can check the credentials and verify the qualifications of the director and author of the texts and of the members of the team. In the event the visitor wishes to have more information, there is a permanent opportunity to communicate through e-mail, different pages provide the possibility to contact us and the team always answers the mail.
As the director and curator of MUVA, my goal is that it should make a broad spectrum of Uruguay's artistic creativity available. One my objectives is to exhibit all kinds of first class Uruguayan art. The museum is particularly pledged to Modern and Contemporary art and emphasises its commitment to contemporary visual languages that receive scant attention in Uruguayan museums and is less known on the international scene. It tries to cover the art of the masters, the highlights of Uruguayan art and, at the same time, mid-career art and that of cutting edge artists. MUVA has openness to a variety of forms, styles and media. It displays prints, collages, paintings and an installation, sculptures, photography of different periods and styles: Modern, Contemporary, cutting edge. One of my ideas and one of MUVA's main characteristics is to make it possible to get to know little-explored, often almost inaccessible areas. It allows viewers to reach works in artists' studios and in private collections, ranging from the youngest artists to the masters.
In the process of the curatorial work and decisions that lie in my hands, I visit private collections and artist's studios, make the selection of the artworks that are more interesting and that are not exhibited frequently or that have never been exhibited. Then I write the texts, build the bibliography and write the biographies. The texts are written from an art history perspective and follow the pattern of the writings of the books and monographs I have been writing for 20 years.
MUVA tries to maintain the discourse and practice of art history and museum exhibition as regards classification, context, understanding of the viewers and reception. Concerning information, a considerable amount has been put on line about the artists and the images. MUVA aims at creating a substantive commentary on the works and their historical and aesthetic context because we think that this is a very important characteristic of any good museum on the Web.
It includes the normal information given by museums regarding the works of art, (title, date, and size, technique, medium, and location) plus explanatory texts, texts about the historical and cultural context and references to schools, styles, or periods that the works of art represent. Biographies and bibliographies are also included. It also attempt to include personal statements by the artists, particularly in the case of young or cutting edge ones; I do not want to be an hegemonic curator.
MUVA provides wide information on the museum itself in the section Info. Every detail is explained so the visitor has information about the purpose, the origin of the idea, the authorship, message from the director, resume of the director, message by the sponsor, the team, a help section, the history of the sponsor, links, awards, the virtual architecture, the browser required.
The analysis of this virtual museum will show the issues faced by its creator, a trained art historian and the way I have to cope with several problems. It will address the motivation and rationale for the creation of a virtual museum in a Third World country like Uruguay that is different from other situations. In this case it is very much related to the situation of art in the country and its social and cultural characteristics and not only to the impact of Internet as a new medium. The country's art scene faces all kinds of problems linked to its socio-economic situation and there are many factors hindering its visibility and its knowledge. In regard to art history, there is an enormous problem in education since no university either public or private offers Master or PhD degrees in art history and most of us have to study abroad or lead a self-taught specialisation. The cultural level of Uruguayan college education is very high. Nevertheless the visual arts do not receive the attention they deserve. No B.A, M.A or Ph.D. programs exist in the field of history of art, although Humanities and Social Sciences are well developed in other areas such as History, Sociology, Linguistics, Literature etc. There are no University courses on Uruguayan art history.
Furthermore most of the books and catalogues on Uruguayan art are sold only in the country, published in Spanish and therefore not available for an international audience. Thus through this experience and through electronic publishing texts can reach a wide audience. Exhibitions, museums and art centres are not in a good situation and there is a big difference between Uruguay and the developed countries in this respect.
There is a gap between the level of creation, the abundant consumption of culture, the high level of attendance to exhibitions and the budget devoted to museums and collections, publications and education. There is also a gap between the level of quality and the fertile production of art, the enormous quantity of artists in relation to the population and the very low level of investment in museums, collections, purchase of art and a policy of art in public spaces. There is a contrast between the general situation of Uruguay and the circumstances under which the art scene and art history develops.
Therefore the creation of MUVA is in part related to the frustrations and limitations stemming from certain socio-economic realities and to the constraints of the Uruguayan society. Some constraints disappear in Cyberspace.
A web-museum will not solve the problems of Uruguayan art and Uruguayan art history. Furthermore, the intention is neither to substitute reality nor to usurp contacts with real artworks (I am aware of Jean Braudillard and Paul Virilio's warnings and my dream, as a curator, art historian and as a Uruguayan is that we might have in the future a real state of the art museum). This web-museum is an alternative medium to give more visibility to Uruguayan art, to spread knowledge about Uruguayan art and calm frustrations in an another realm - the virtual world &endash; possibly giving Uruguayan art a new place in the world.
On the other side the concepts about museums have changed. Museums no longer necessarily have walls and are no longer only repositories, but they can also be on line information resources, forum of discourse, useful for research, dissemination of knowledge. A web museum as the advantage of being an interactive system where any art can be experienced by any person any time at any place since Internet is descentered and placeless. Museums no longer need to have walls and are no longer only repositories, but rather information resources. And this idea is not so new: Marcel Duchamp created a portable museum (La Boîte A Valise) and André Malraux invented the concept of Le Musée Imaginaire . Virtual museum curators and art historians webmasters are freed from the restrictions of time and space. On the either side it is economically viable for a small and developing nation responding in a low cost enterprise to the scholarly and entertainment needs. So virtual museum have a special type of usefulness and a special type of organisation.
The museum aims to make the presence of art history in Internet more cosmopolitan and varied. Therefore it uses Internet as liberating weapon that can give small countries, the right to speak about their art, the right to show the art, the right to analyse and spread knowledge about their art and art history discourses.
Using mobility and new media give the options to discover Uruguayan art and culture, integrate it into "world culture" which still implies a hegemonial stance and mainly means First World countries. Through this experience there is an Uruguayan art historian speaking about Uruguayan art to the Uruguayans and the foreigners all over the world, in a free museum, during 24 hours, every day of the year and it opens the doors for other experiences of this type. She and the museum can offer accurate content well presented and good enough to engage knowledgeable Internet users.
So far it tries to aspire to provide the visitors with a unique and interesting experience that causes them to want to bookmark and revisit and in an interactive way involve them on an intellectual and personal level.
Something that makes its rather special is that the museum is at the same time attractive, has an easy navigation and bring art history content in a virtual showcase of works from private collectors and artist's studios, and brings together the most renown works of Uruguayan art, that otherwise would not reach the public. This is an important factor since the Uruguayan museum have very poor and limited collections, contemporary art in underepresented, there is almost no budget for acquisitions and many works remain in the artists's studios and is only seen in temporary exhibitions. Trough the virtual museum many works of art are discovered and enjoyed. Through the museum it is possible to get to know little-explored, often almost inaccessible areas.
The fact that it is shown in a 100% virtual environment, an example of a virtual building, it also appealing. In it overall conception MUVA has been recognized as a pioneer. MUVA wants to give the sensation of being inside a real museum because Uruguay does not have a first class building to house its collections. Thus the building was designed by four architects commissioned for the MUVA. Although only a virtual space, the site provides the experience of touring a physical gallery. The idea is to use the Web as an exhibition medium that can recreate the museum experience, to mimic, to an extent, the sensation of being inside a building. The visitor can actually walk inside the museum, take the elevator, go up the stairs . without downloading any software or using any special computer: MUVA wants to make it easy for the navigator and reach everybody. And this also one goal.
This paper deals with the issues of the use of web-sites for teaching, learning, research an d publication in the history of art in a collective digital resource. Therefore it relates to the main subject of the Academic Section 23 as stated in the General Introduction.
ALICIA HABER. Address: Leyenda Patria 3104, apto 502, 11300 Montevideo, Uruguay, Fax 598 2 71 87 35, Telephone 598 2 710 95 64, Email:ahaber@netgate.com.uy
http://www.diarioelpais.com/muva2/
http://www.diarioelpais.com/muva/
Chief curator, Department of Culture, Museum Section, Municipality of Montevideo, Uruguay.
Chief art critic, newspaper El País, Montevideo, Uruguay.
Director creator and project director MUVA, Museo Virtual de Artes -Virtual Museum of Arts http://www.diarioelpais.com/muva
http://www.diarioelpais.com/muva2
Instituto de Profesores Artigas, Montevideo, Uruguay. Graduated 1974.
Two semesters as visiting student (courses for credits, all grades "A"), College of Liberal Arts, University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign, 1973.
Profesora de Historia, Instituto de Profesores Artigas, 1974.
Workshop on Semiotics and Art. Director: Professor Jorge Medina Vidal, 1979 -1982. Montevideo.
Seminar on the Bauhaus, School of Architecture, University of the Republic. Professor Dr. Detlev Noack, of the Superior School of Berlin and Art School of Kassel, Germany 1977. Montevideo.
Summer courses, University of the Republic: "New ways to study and teach history." 1972. Montevideo.
Getty Travel Grant, Art/ History, Objects, Meaning, Judgement, History of Art symposium, April september, 1998. Los Angeles The Getty Center
Fulbright Grant, Museum of Contemporary Art, The School of the Art Institute, Chicago, 1997.
Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs - Chicago Artist International Program CAIP for an exchange residency program as an art manager in the Museum of Contemporary Art. 5 weeks April - May 1995.
Rockefeller Foundation Mentor Grant for the College Art Association Annual Conference. January 1995.
To present a paper on: "The gaucho as a mythical figure in the paintings of Juan Manuel Blanes"
To be a mentor of two Master Degree candidates in Art History, San Antonio, Texas, January 1995.
Fulbright Grant, Senior Scholar Research Grant, University of Texas at Austin, January - March 1985.
Best Latin American Critic of the Year, Association of Argentinean Art Critics, AICA, 1988.
Best Art Critic of the Year, Department of Culture, Municipality of Montevideo, 1985.
Professor of History of Art, Instituto de Profesores Artigas, since 1985 (Since 1989 on special leave of absence for curatorial work at the Municipality).
Assistant professor of History of Art, College of Humanities, University of the Republic, 1977 - 1985.
Lecturer of History of Art, Preparatory School for Architecture (Secondary Education), 1973 - 1985.
Lecturer of History of Art in private Preparatory School of Architecture ( Liceo Integral Hebreo-Uruguayo, 1973 - 1978, British Schools International Baccalaureate, 1977 (courses taught in English), Liceo Americano, 1976).
As Independent Curator:
"Retrospective of works on paper by José Gurvich", 1945-1973. Fundación Buquebus Montevideo, Uruguay May &endash; July 1999 and Centro Jorge Luis Borges, Buenos Aires, September &endash; October 1999.
Co - curator of the travelling exhibition "Viento Sur III" of art from Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile. Inauguration: March 1996. Exhibited during 1997-99 at Cascavel (Paco das artes), Brasilia (Palacio Itamaraty), Río de Janeiro (Galeria Século XXI), Sao Paulo (Museo de Arte de San Pablo), Curitiba (Museo de Arte Contemporánea) and other Brazilian and Argentiniana museums.
Co - curator of the travelling exhibition "Viento Sur II" of art from Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile. Inauguration: March 1996. Exhibited during 1996 at Cascavel (Paco das artes), Brasilia (Palacio Itamaraty), Río de Janeiro (Galeria Século XXI), Sao Paulo (Museo de Arte de San Pablo), Curitiba (Museo de Arte Contemporánea) and other Brazilian and Argentiniana museums..
"Life in a boundless land: the gaucho scenes of Juan Manuel Blanes", October - December, Americas Society, New York 1994. Travelling exhibition to Center of Fine Arts in Miami and Museum of Tucson during 1995.
Co - curator of the travelling exhibition "Viento Sur" I of art from Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile. Inauguration: August 6, 1994. To be presented during 1994 - 1995 at Cascavel (Paco das artes), Brasilia (Palacio Itamaraty), Río de Janeiro (Palacio da Cultura Gustavo Capanema), Sao Paulo (Museo de Arte de San Pablo), Curitiba (Museo de Arte Contemporánea), Paraguay (Centro Cultural de la Ciudad) and Madrid (Casa de América).
"Festival Franco Latinoamericano de video - arte", travelling exhibition to Santiago de Chile, Buenos Aires, Bogotá, Montevideo, October - November 1993.
"Festival de papel", art on paper, November, Montevideo 1993.
As Curator and Chief Curator at the Department of Culture of the Municipality of Montevideo, Museum Section since 1988-Chief curator since 1998:
Martín Verges Rilla, May, Centro Municipal de Exposiciones, 1999
"Signo", installation and performance, Florencia Flanagan, Juan Burgos , Fernando López Lage, Historial Museum Cabildo, May 1999,
Jorge Soto, Cabildo, octubre-noviembre 1988
"Mujeres artistas del Uruguay", Centro Municipal de Exposiciones 1998.
Carlos Musso, Historical Museum Cabildo , July 1998.
Germán Cabrera Traversoni, Historical Museum Cabildo , August 1997.
Darío Ferrari, Historical Museum Cabildo, April 1997.
"Montevideo y la Plástica", Municipal Center of Exhibitions, November, 1996.
Virginia Patrone, Historical Museum Cabildo, October 1996.
Pablo Montañez, Installation, Historical Museum Cabildo, November 1995.
"Bye, bye, yauguru: ojo que no siente corazón que no ve", Installation by Nelbia Romero, Municipal Exhibition Hall, September - October 1995
Carlos Barea, "Paintings", Historical Museum Cabildo, August - September 1995.
Roberto Fernández, "Photography", Historical Museum Cabildo, July - August 1995.
Javier Basssi,"Paintings", Historical Museum Cabildo, July 1995
Javier Gil, "Drawings", Historical Museum Cabildo, April - May 1995.
Mario Sagradini, "Frutos del país", Municipal Exhibition Hall, October - November 1994.
Ricardo Lanzarini, Installation, August, Historical Museum Cabildo, 1994
Gustavo Fernández, "Cave Canem", Historical Museum Cabildo, May - June 1994.
Luis Camnitzer, "El libro de los muros", Municipal Exhibition Hall, April - July 1993.
Nelbia Romero, "Más allá de las palabras", Municipal Exhibition Center, November - December 1992.
Germán Cabrera, "Retrospective", Municipal Exhibition Hall, July - August 1992.
Carlos Capelán, "Mapas y Paisajes", Municipal Exhibition Hall, March - April 1992.
Naúl Ojeda, "Woodcuts", Municipal Exhibition Center, December 1991.
1st Biennial of Art in Aluminium, "Aluarte 91", Municipal Exhibition Hall, November 1991.
Carlos Seveso, "Painting", Municipal Exhibition Center, September 1991.
Jorge Damiani, "Retrospective", Municipal Exhibition Hall, July 1991
Rimer Cardillo, "Charrúas y Montes Criollos", Municipal Exhibition Hall and Museum Fernando García since April 1991.
Eduardo Cardozo, "Painting", Municipal Exhibition Center, April 1991.
Miguel Fabruccini, "Painting", Municipal Exhibition Center, December 1990.
"Nuevas Propuestas Escultóricas", Municipal Exhibition Hall, November 1990.
Ernesto Vila, "Collage", Municipal Exhibition Center, August 1990.
Lacy Duarte, "Rituales, mitos, espejos y mentiras", Municipal Exhibition Center, July 1990.
Fernando López Lage, "Painting", Municipal Exhibition Center, June - July 1990
José Pelayo, "On site installation", Municipal Exhibition Center, May - June 1990.
Fidel Sclavo, "Historias de agua", Municipal Exhibition Center, October - November 1989.
Luis Solari, "Retrospective", Municipal Exhibition Hall and Museum Blanes October 1989 to March 1990.
Taller Cuarambó, "Ceramics", Municipal Exhibition Center, September 1989.
Hugo Nantes, "Sculpture", Municipal Exhibition Center, July - August, 1989.
Agueda Dicancro, "Otras Visiones", Municipal Exhibition Hall, June - July, 1989.
Francisco Matto, "Retrospective", Municipal Exhibition Hall, April, 1989.
Carlos González, "Retrospective", Municipal Exhibition Center and Museum Blanes September 1988 to January 1989.
Tola Invernizzi, "Retrospective", Municipal Exhibition Center, May 1987.
Creator , project an general director of MUVA, Museo Virtual de Artes, Virtual Museum of Arts http://www.diarioelpais.com/muva , http://www.diarioelpais.com/muva2/
José Gurvich: el mundo íntimo de un artista, Fundación Buquebus, Montevideo, Uruguay, 1999.
Visions of life: The glass sculpture of Agueda Dicancro" A woman's gaze, Latin American Women Artists, edited by Marjorie Agosin, Wellesley College, White Pine Press, New York 1999.
"De la circunspección a la exploración de la intimidad", essay in Historias de la vida privada en el Uruguay, editors Barrán, Caetano y Porzecanski, Volúmen 3, Taurus, Montevideo, 1998.
Guía Pocitos Punta Carretas Montevideo Julio C. Gaeta and Eduardo Folle, Elarqa, Montevideo, 1997.
Manos del Uruguay: cooperatives rurales d'artisanes textiles", in Mains de Femmes, sous la direction de Jocelyne Etienne-Nugue, Femmes Plus, Editions UNESCO PARIS, 1995 Preface Federico Mayor, Directeur General de L'UNESCO
Entries on Uruguayan art in The Dictionary of Art, Macmillan Publishers Limited, 1996.
"Uruguay", Latin American Art in the Twentieth Century, Phaidon Press - chapter on Uruguayan art, edited by Edward Sullivan, 1996 (in English). Arte Latinoamericano del siglo XX, Spanish, Nerea, Spain.
The Art of Juan Manuel Blanes, - Americas Society and Fundación Bunge y Born, - co - autors: Katherine Manthorne (Universtiy of Chicago at Urbana Champaign) and Edward Sullivan (New York University) 212 p. (English and Spanish editions)
"Mitologías de ausencia en el arte uruguayo de hoy: las instalaciones de Rimer Cardillo y Nelbia Romero" in Artes Plásticas na América Latina Contemporánea, edited by María Amélia Bulhoes y María Lúcia Bastos Kern, Editora da Universidade, Universidade Federal do Río Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil, 1994.
Historia del arte, vol 2., Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, April 1985, 242 p.
Arte uruguayo contemporáneo: cinco propuestas, Banda Oriental, December 1984, 93 p.
Historia del arte, vol 1, Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, March 1979, 211 p.
Vernacular culture in Uruguayan art. An analysis of the documentary functions of the works of Pedro Figari, Carlos González and Luis Solari, Latin American and Caribbean Center, Florida International University, 1981.
La invención de la realidad y la realidad de la invención en la pintura de Martín Verges Rilla, Departamento de Cultura, I.M.M, 1999.
Ricardo Migliorisi: un mundo de gozosa e inquietante fantasía, Del Paseo, 1999
"La cerámica de Eva Díaz Torres" , Museo Torres García, octubre 1988
"Mujeres e historia del arte: apuntes desde la disciplina", 20 artistas mujeres de hoy, Departamento de Cultura, I.M.M, 1998.
Carlos Musso, testimonios de una realidad conflictiva, Departament of Culture, Municipality of Montevideo, July 1998.
"El bosque de Birnam" catálogo de la exposición de Mercedes González, Museo de Arte Americano de Maldonado, Maldonado, January 1998.
Germán Cabrera Traversoni, Departament of Culture, Municipality of Montevideo ,August 1997.
Darío Ferrari, Departament of Culture, Municipality of Montevideo .April 1997.
Virginia Patrone, , Departament of Culture, Municipality of Montevideo , October 1996.
Los artistas dialogan con Montevideo, Montevideo y la Plástica, Intendencia Municipal de Montevideo, November 1996.
"Juan Manuel Blanes: el gaucho como mito" in Blanes dibujos y bocetos co - authors: Gabriel Peluffo, Laura Malossetti, Roberto Amigo, Nelson Di Maggio, Museo Blanes, December 1995.
Un mundo fragmentado, Pablo Montañez, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, November 1995.
Nelbia Romero: ritos de despedida y bienvenida, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, September 1995
El artista como alquimista, Carlos Barea, ,Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, August 1995.
Los silencios remotos de Javier Bassi, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, July 1995.
Los escenarios fantásticos de Javier Gil, ,Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, April 1995.
Panorama heterogéneo, exhibition Viento Sur, Paraná, Brazil, 1994.
Un envío representativo de la creatividad videoartística en el Uruguay, 2do Festival Franco Latinoamericano de video -arte, 1993.
Luis Camnitzer: evocación y lirismo, Municipality of Montevideo, Division of Culture, May - July 1993.
Construcciones en madera y óleos de Torres García, Galería Sur, Summer 1993.
Al encuentro de las culturas subyacentes, Nelbia Romero, "Más allá de las palabras", Municipality of Montevideo, Division of Culture, November 1992.
Germán Cabrera: paradigma de artista investigador, Retrospective of Cabrera, Municipality of Montevideo, Division of Culture, October 1992
Una mirada inquisitiva: los dibujos de Arotxa, Ediciones de la Plaza, Montevideo, 1992.
Una formulación antropológica, Carlos Capelán, "Mapas y Paisajes", Municipality of Montevideo, Division of Culture, March 1992.
De lo vivencial a lo metafísico: el arte de Jorge Damiani, Retrospective, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, July 1991.
La inestabilidad existencial en las pinturas de Carlos Seveso, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, September 1991.
El escenario de la memoria, Installation "Charrúas y Montes Criollos" ,Rimer Cardillo, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, April 1991.
6 Propuestas pictóricas uruguayas, catalogue for the Primera Semana Cultural Iberoamericana, Bogotá, Colombia, March 1991.
Ernesto Vila, works on paper, Museum of Modern Art of Latin America, Washington, December 1990.
La lección del maestro, Cúneo Perinetti, Galería Latina, October 1990.
Una realidad transfigurada. Luis Solari, una visión retrospectiva, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, August 1989.
Lacy Duarte, pinturas, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, July 1990.
Imágenes inquietantes, Hugo Nantes, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, July 1989.
Detrás de un vidrio claroscuro, Agueda Dicancro, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, June 1989.
Vicente Martín, Galería Latina, 1989.
Estructuras mágicas, retrospective of Francisco Matto, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, April 1989.
Torres García y la tradición mediterránea, Museo Torres García, 1988.
Tola Invernizzi, Municipality of Montevideo, Department of Culture, May 1987.
Clever Lara, Galería Nueva, Lima, Perú, 1985.
La exuberancia expresiva de Jorge Páez: ecos y visiones del presente, Comisión Nacional de Artes Plásticas y Visuales, 1984.
Articles in magazines (selection).
"Dans six pays d' Ámerique du Sud- Uruguay", Beaux Arts, France, numero 168,May 1998 p 54-55
"I Bienal del Mercosur", Art Nexus, , Colombia - Estados Unidos.
enero - marzo 1998, pp 80 &endash; 83
"Rimer Cardillo, El escenario de la memoria", Art Nexus, Arte en Colombia, Colombia, April - June 1994, pp 60 - 64.
"Luis Camnitzer: el libro de los muros montevideanos", Art Nexus, Arte en Colombia, Colombia, January - May 1994, pp 76 - 79.
"Carlos Musso, Objetos lúdicos", Elarqa, Montevideo, October 1993, pp 80 - 84.
"Las cajas de Nelson Ramos: una búsqueda de la identidad", Europ - art internacional, Buenos Aires, May - June 1993, pp 40- 42.
"Carlos Capelán. Una formulación antropológica", Art Nexus, Arte en Colombia, Colombia, March 1993, pp 92 - 96.
"Profiles: Nelson Ramos", Latin American Art, U.S.A, October 1992, pp 79 - 80.
"Luis Camnitzer y Mario Sagradini", Art Nexus, Arte en Colombia, Colombia, January 1992, pp 48 - 51.
"Agueda Dicancro", Arte en Colombia, Colombia, October 1990, pp.64 - 66.
"Luis Camnitzer: análisis, lirismo y compromiso", Plástica, Puerto Rico, 1988, pp 35- 40.
"Torres García antes y después", Artinf, Buenos Aires, Autumn 1988, pp.36 - 38.
"La pintura uruguaya en Buenos Aires: José Cúneo", Artinf, Buenos Aires, Spring 1987, p.9.
"Uruguay ponderabilidad de los materiales", Artinf, Buenos Aires, Autumn 1987, p.36.
"Dignificación de lo manual: depuración formal de la cerámica de Silveira y Abbondanza", Boletín del Centro Interamericano de Artesanías y Artes Populares, N 11, Ecuador, February 1982.
"Una visita al taller de Germán Cabrera", Imágenes, August 1980 pp. 23 - 25.
"Los elementos vernáculos en la plástica uruguaya", Imágenes, February, 1979, p.7.
"El lirismo de la evocación: la pintura de Pedro Figari", Imágenes, April 1978, p.32.
"Carlos Federico Sáez o el deleite de la pintura vital", Imágenes, December 1977, p.31.
More than 1.000 articles in the cultural section of "El País" since 1982 and in "El País Cultural".
Papers in professional meetings:
Papers in professional meetings: Invited Speaker &endash; International and National Speaking Engagements
"Museo Virtual de Artes," paper presented in the panel A Virtual/Human Interfaces for Virtual Exhibitions (Ben Davis, Getty Information Institute, Los Angeles- Gail Rubini, Florida State University, Tallahassee ). College Art Associaton, L.A 1999.
"Virtual Museum of Arts ", presentation at the Getty Internet Forum at CAA.. Digital show and tell. CAA members on the cutting edge of digital technology. Organized by Kathleen Cohen, CAA Education Committee. Getty Information Group. 3-4:30 Alicia Haber. Museo Virtual de Artes, Uruguay
"Montevideo y la plástica", panel Memoria y espacio urrbano. Symposium, Memoria social. Comunidades y fragmentaciones.jueves 12 a sábado 14 de noviembre 1998, Instituto Goethe y Alianza Francesa
"The importance of a Virtual Museum in a Thirld World country: the experience of MUVA, Virtual Museum of Arts EL Pais", Museums and the Web, Toronto, Canadá, 22 - 25 April 1998.
"Museo Virtual de Artes", Congreso Internacional de Internet World 1998, Buenos Aires, 31 March- April 4, 1998.
"Arte y Diseño en Internet: la experiencia de el MUVA" 1er Congreso Uruguayo de Informática,, Montevideo November 24 - 25 , 1997.
"El gaucho como mito", symposium "Juan Manuel Blanes", Argentinian and Uruguayan art historians and critics, Juan Manuel Blanes Museum, December 1995.
"Construyendo nuevos imaginarios: el arte en la post - dictadura", symposium "El problema de la identidad en el arte uruguayo", Goethe Institut, December 1994.
""Construyendo nuevos imaginarios: el arte en la post - dictadura", symposium "El problema de la identidad en el arte uruguayo", Goethe Institut, December 1994.
"Juan Manuel Blanes: The Gaucho as a mythical character", Issues in 19th Century Latin American Art and Art History. College Art Association Annual Conference, San Antonio 1995.
"Arte uruguayo de hoy", conference of art critics from the Southern Cone, "Viento Sur". Cascavel, Paraná, Brazil, August 6 1994
"Instalaciones sobre problemas de la identidad uruguaya de hoy", IV Symposium on Visual Arts of Porto Alegre (Universidad Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Pontificia Universidade de Río Grande do Sul, Prefeitura de Porto Alegre): Arte en América Latina Contemporánea" Porto Alegre, Brazil, July 4 to 8 1994
"Mitologías de ausencia en el arte uruguayo actual" in "Los signos del arte", 1st Latinamerican symposium on Esthetics and Criticism, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Facultad de Arquitectura, Diseño y Urbanismo, Buenos Aires, Argentina, November 1993.
"Algunos aspectos subregionales del arte actual en latinoamerica", First Municipal Meeting of Latin American artists and critics, symposium: Nuevas voces y contexto en el arte latinoamericano actual. Museo Blanes, Montevideo, November 18 1993
"Propuestas antropológicas en el encuentro de dos mundos", IV symposium of Theory and History of Art, Las artes en el debate del V Centenario, Centro Argentino de Investigadores de Arte, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Buenos Aires, October 1992.
"Beyond Orthodoxy: The validation of Torres García's legacy in Contemporary Uruguayan art", Inverted Map: The School of the South, Post Modernist Issues, Symposium organized by the University of Texas at Austin, November 1991.
"Los problemas de la crítica de arte en el Uruguay", International Meeting of Art Critics (AICA), Biennale of Sao Paulo, October 1987.
"El sincretismo en el arte uruguayo contemporáneo y la relexificación de los modelos europeos": 47th International Congress of Americanists, Amsterdam, July 1987.
"Promoción de la creatividad artística", 1st Simposium of Innovation and Creativity, CID UNDP UN, Montevideo, December 1985.
"Análisis de las respuestas a la tradición europea en el arte uruguayo a través de la obra de José Cúneo", 44th International Congress of Americanists, Manchester, September 1982.
"Vernacular culture in national art: an analysis of the documentary functions of Uruguayan art", 8th National Meeting of the Latin American Studies Association (LASA), Pittsburgh, April 1979.
Three Workshops for PhD students of art history and one lecture on Contemporary Uruguayan Art at the Department of History of Art, University of Chicago, April, May 1997. "Contemporary Uruguayan art and "Contemporary Uruguayan art: private life and the inner self in a time of change 1955 &endash; 1996".
"Reality and Myth in Blanes's Gaucho Paintings", Americas Society, New York, October, 1994.
"The gauchos of Blanes", Center for the Fine Arts, Miami, January, 1995.
"Uruguayan art today", State University of San Diego, Department of Visual Arts, Department of Latin American Studies, November 1990.
"Los desafíos de las vanguardias", Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, Montevideo, 1986.
"Arte uruguayo: respuestas a una década crítica", Museum of Modern Art of Latin America, Washington D.C, March 1985.
"Contemporary tendencies in Uruguayan art", Department of History of Art, College of Fine Arts, University of Texas at Austin, February 1985.
"Vernacular contents in Uruguayan art", Institute of Latin American Studies, University of Texas at Austin, February 1985.
Premio Paul Cézanne, 1998.
VI Certamen de Plásticos Jóvenes Coca - Cola, 1994.
Primer Festival de Creatividad Escolar,1992
Premio de Londres, Instituto Anglo Uruguayo, 1993.
Promadera 1992, Premio "El País" a las artesanías en madera .
Premio Paul Cézanne, Embajada de Francia, 1992.
Premio Nacional de Artes Plásticas, Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, 1992.
Artesanías Uruguayas, Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores, Exposición itinerante de artesanía artística para los Estados Unidos, 1991.
Logotipo uruguayo para la Exposición de Sevilla, Comisión V Centenario, Presidencia de la República, 1991.
V Certamen de Plásticos Jóvenes Coca - Cola, 1991.
Aluarte 91, 1991.
Premio Paul Cézanne, Embajada de Francia, 1991.
Premio Paul Cézanne , Embajada de Francia, 1990.
Nuevas Propuestas Escultóricas, Departamento de Cultura I.M.M y Embajada de Suiza, 1990.
Monumento Golda Meir, Comité Central Israelita, Intendencia Municipal de Montevideo, Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, 1990.
Salón de Tapiz y Cerámica, Museo del Gaucho y la Moneda, 1990.
Best exhibitions of the year, International Art Critics Association, Uruguayan chapter, 1990.
Best exhibitions of the year, International Art Critics Association, Uruguayan chapter, 1988.
III Certamen de Plásticos Jóvenes Coca Cola, 1987.
Concurso de escultura José Belloni, Departamento de Cultura I.M.M y Embajada de Suiza, 1987.
Premio Nacional de Remuneraciones literarias (sección artes plásticas), Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, member of the annualjury since 1987.
Award to the best review published for the XXXV Salón Municipal, 1987.
Bienarte 1, Alianza Uruguay - E.E.U.U, 1986.
34 Salón Municipal de Montevideo, 1986.
Bienal de Arte Joven, MAAM Maldonado; VI Premio del Este para Arte Joven, 1986.
Concurso de Miniescultura, Alianza Uruguay E.E.U.U, 1983.
Bienal de Arte Joven Museum of Latin American Art (MAAM), Maldonado; III Premio del Este para Jóvenes Pintores, 1980.
Art History Consultant for Videos on Contemporary Uruguayan artists for TV Ciudad Channel 24, 1998-1999.
Jorge Damiani, Canal 5, 1990.
Francisco Matto, Testoni Studios, aired by Canal 5, 1989.
Luis Solari, Canal 5, 1989.
Brazil, Paraná, curator, exhibition Viento Sur II Ministerio de Turismo y Deporte del Estado de Paraná y Municipalidad de Cascavel, Brazil, March 1996.
Sweden, Panel Moderator, International Art Critics Association, AICA. September 1994,
Brazil, Porto Alegre, paper presenter, VII Festival de Arte de la Ciudad de Porto Alegre y el IV Simposio de Artes Plásticas, Universidad Federal and Universidad Pontificia, July 1994
Brazil, Paraná, curator Viento Sur I and paper presenter, in the symposium of art critics, Ministerio de Turismo y Deporte del Estado de Paraná y Municipalidad de Cascavel, Brasil, August 1994.
Australia, Sydney, to co - organize an exhibition of Australian Crafts in Uruguay, Australian Crafts Council and Australian Council, March 1993. (In May 1994 the exhibition "The art of the object" was presented in the Municipal Exhibition Hall).
U.S.A. visit to museums of California, USIA, November 1991.
Italy, to visit the exhibition Arte Uruguayo Contemporáneo, Instituto Latinoamericano de Roma IILA, 1989.
Italy, to attend the Venice Biennale, Instituto Italiano de Cultura, 1988.
Germany, to attend Kassel Documenta and visit museums of contemporary art, Inter Nationes, 1987
Sweden, to attend the Tapestry Biennale of Laussanne and visit museums of contemporary, Pro Helvetia, 1987
Germany, to attend Kassel Documenta and visit museum of contemporary art, Inter Nationes, 1982
U.S.A to visit museums in New York, USIA, 1979.
To Alcan, Coca Cola, Fábrica Nacional del Papel and Central Bank of Uruguay.
Partner of MULTIPLA Consultoría de arte SRL. 1996 - 1998 (MULTIPLA SRL has worked from February 14, 1996 to 1998 for the Central Bank of Uruguay. Creation of a collection of Contemporary Uruguayan art).
Member of Professional Organizations:
ICOM International Council of Museums.
AICA International Art Critics Association
CIMAM International Council of Modern Art Museums.
CAA College Art Association. U.S.A
ALAA Association of Latin American Art
AHWA (Art History Web Masters)
Excellent command of Spanish. Very good command of English. Good knowledge of French. Italian and Portuguese.
Art History Webmasters
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Since November 14, 1997.
Depuis le 14 novembre 1997.
