A Program to Protect and Elevate artwork
from Community-Led Movements
The Balboa Art Conservation Center created the Preserve Community Art! program as part of the organization’s ongoing commitment to protect important cultural heritage. Through this initiative BACC provides pro bono art conservation services for culturally significant works that emerge from community-led movements in the San Diego area.
This program has several overarching goals:
- To serve as a resource for the art that is created as a direct result of community-led movements, the individuals who create the art, and the organizations that might later showcase or collect the art objects.
- To document and preserve a type of human expression that normally emerges and disappears quickly (so that future generations may learn from it).
- And finally, to expand the definition of what holds artistic importance. Too often the mainstream asserts that the only art that matters is older, commissioned, or displayed in museums. By treating community-created objects with the same care and respect that we provide to priceless works of art, BACC is noting that community-led movements are both historically and artistically important.
What might preserving the artistic expression of community-led movements look like via this program?
- BACC assisting with the photographic documentation of art objects or murals, artist interviews, and condition assessments during or immediately following a socially significant movement.
- Conservation staff making recommendations for artists, exhibition spaces, and collecting institutions about the safe handling, display, and storage of artwork or completing conservation treatments on damaged artwork or activist-related documents.
- BACC facilitating discussions with artists and affiliated organizations about conservation and preservation ethics, preservation strategies vs. accepted ephemerality of artwork, and artists’ rights over said artwork (for example the Federal Visual Artists Rights Act, California Artist Preservation Act) ... and more.
Projects will be considered for this program on a case-by-case basis. Organizations and individuals interested in submitting work or ideas for consideration are encouraged to do so by emailing communityarts@bacc.org.
Free Resource Guides
Spurred by the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests throughout the country and in our own city, BACC wanted to help protesters preserve their politically- and socially-driven art (including posters, murals, and photos) by creating free, downloadable guides specifically for the care of protest art. Our Preserve Protest Art! guides are available in both English and Spanish. Download the guides here.
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Motivados por y en respuesta a las protestas de Black Lives Matter a través de todo el país y en nuestra propia ciudad en 2020, BACC quería ayudar a los manifestantes a preservar su arte basado en mensajes de justicia social (incluyendo carteles, murales y fotos) mediante la creación de guías gratuitas y descargables, diseñadas específicamente para preservar el arte creado para y por estas protestas. Nuestras guías ¡Preserva el arte de protesta! están disponibles tanto en inglés como en español. Descarga las guías aquí.
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Motivados por y en respuesta a las protestas de Black Lives Matter a través de todo el país y en nuestra propia ciudad en 2020, BACC quería ayudar a los manifestantes a preservar su arte basado en mensajes de justicia social (incluyendo carteles, murales y fotos) mediante la creación de guías gratuitas y descargables, diseñadas específicamente para preservar el arte creado para y por estas protestas. Nuestras guías ¡Preserva el arte de protesta! están disponibles tanto en inglés como en español. Descarga las guías aquí.