AMACI and OGR Torino Host International Symposium on Post-Digital Museums

The Italian Association of Museums of Contemporary Art (AMACI), in collaboration with OGR Torino and with support from Fondazione CRT, organized an international symposium titled "Musei e post-digital" (Museums and Post-Digital) in Turin. The event, held on November 2017, featured contributions from Gail Cochrane and Pier Paolo Peruccio of the Politecnico di Torino, and keynote speaker Boris Groys. AMACI director Lorenzo Giusti explained that the term "post-digital" describes a phase after the initial digital revolution, where digital languages are normalized and fused with art, dissemination, and design. The symposium aimed to critically analyze the current condition of museums in the post-digital era, addressing topics such as the collapse of physical space, reproducibility of digital materials, open source concepts, and expanded authorship. Giusti noted that Italian institutions have lagged in theoretical discourse, prompting AMACI to launch the "Museo XXI" platform for ongoing investigation. The symposium deliberately avoided being a celebration of digital opportunities, instead examining both opportunities and risks, including the impact of online viewing on physical museum visits and the materiality of artworks. The event did not cover legislative or copyright issues, which Giusti plans to address in a forthcoming publication.