Authors
Mark Seton (University of Sydney)
Abstract
I will address the paradoxical dynamic of enablement and constraint of digitised documentation from scripts to designs to video recordings that can be accessed by performing arts researchers, teachers, students and practitioners. In particular, I will argue that the function of digitised performance documentation is to assist potential users in locating people, objects and events documented in the archival record of performance within a spatial and temporal context. This paper will be contextualised, specifically, through reflections on the work I have done on incorporating the Sidetrack Performance Group archives (including texts, photos, posters and video recordings of performances) into the AusStage database via the Macquarie University Library’s digital repository. The AusStage database, as a result of the third phase of development, now also offers access to digital repositories where articles, reviews, photographs, production documents and videos are digitally stored. Anyone with internet access globally can view these digital objects online.
Out of this practical experience, I will propose ‘best practice’ options relating to ethical issues that emerge between artists and other researchers as a consequence of this new expectation and demand for accessible data on performance ephemera. Four key and inter-dependent concerns come into focus: differing technical specifications and industrial procedures for the creation of both archival quality digital file data and accessible and sustainable digital formats; sourcing of technical facilities and personnel for the digitisation of performance documentation; procedures for placing digital data in servers and ensuring storage and backup support; and, most critically, ensuring aesthetic and cultural contextuality and access while minimising exploitation or misrepresentation of creative stakeholders. Such practices, I will argue, can legitimately and usefully draw upon the four guiding principles of the National Statement for Human Research Ethics, namely, the values of respect, integrity, justice, and beneficence (ie. the precarious balance between benefits and risks).