DIGITAL GRAPHIC
Technologically speaking, traditional photocopy machines evolved in such a way that their functional processes became digitalized and connected to computers. As peripheral devices, they began to carry out input tasks (scanners) and output tasks (printers). The quality was high and the versatility significant.
In the early 1990s, the laboratories and workshops at MIDECIANT in Cuenca, which were then supported and financed by such notable companies as Canon, Apple and Epson, focused on expanding their technological and instrumental resources. The idea was to allow resident artists to engage in all kinds of experiments as they developed their various creations.
The result in Cuenca was the expansion of the research university museum-center’s art and new media heritage toward these new artistic practices. Over time, a new specialized collection dedicated to digital graphics took shape. These were artworks and object-based (material) pieces that described the development of a new digital culture (even as they were contributing to it), laying the groundwork for current art.
Today, MIDECIANT in Cuenca possesses a digital graphics collection comprised of more than 400 digital works. These were created through the use of the various machines that were being invented and commercialized at the time, and through the innovative graphic-technical processes developed by the very artists who spent time in the center’s workshops and labs. They are complemented by other pieces and documentary materials from donations made by individuals and institutions, both public and private.
These facts make the collection entirely unique within its genre. Supported by a historical context clearly laid out by its curators, it explains in great detail the evolution of art and its gradual transformation from analog-based pieces to digital artworks.
All of the pieces in the collection have been classified and can be found in the MIDECIANT archives, located on the UCLM campus in Cuenca. They can be accessed (individually or in groups) by appointment. The administrative team at MIDECIANT is also happy to provide guided tours to interested members of the public and specialists alike.