PRESERVE / REPAIR / DOCUMENT

Workshop

Careful conservation, documented diagnosis and reversible modifications.

⚠ SAFETY FIRST

CRT televisions and power supplies can retain lethal voltages even when unplugged. Electrical work must be performed by trained personnel.

Exterior cleaning

Begin with the least invasive intervention and document the initial condition.

Diagnosis

Do not replace components without measuring, verifying and recording the reason.

Conservation

Control humidity, sunlight, batteries and incompatible materials.

Reversible modification

Always retain the original parts and avoid permanent damage.

Data recovery

Work from copies and preserve the original medium without writing to it.

Traceability

Record tools, products, parts and every technical decision.

GUIDES / VERIFIED

Documented guides

Analysis · 2000

From Ephemeral Comics to Archives: Why Preserving Comics Also Preserves Culture

Comics and comic magazines were created as widely circulated, inexpensive, and vulnerable printed matter. The available documentation shows how archives, museums, digital projects, and collectors have helped reconsider them as cultural sources whose preservation requires context, description, and access—not storage alone.

Open story

Analysis · contemporary

A Console Is Not Enough: Why Archives Change How We Preserve Its History

Preserving a console as an isolated object says little about its cultural life. Drawing on museum and archival principles, this analysis proposes viewing the console, its documentation, context, and public access as an inseparable whole, without assigning a specific model a history not documented by the available evidence.

Open story

Guide · contemporary

Before Switching It On: Documenting an Arcade Machine as Heritage

An editorial guide to approaching an arcade machine through documentation and preventive conservation: identify what is known, record its condition and context, and separate verifiable data from memories.

Open story

Analysis · 1970

From Undocumented Intervention to Documented Restoration

Between 1970 and 2009, several Spanish institutional examples reveal a decisive shift: restoration ceased to be understood only as an intervention on an object and increasingly required documentation, professional coordination, and a historical reading of spaces.

Open story

Guide · contemporary

The Computer Does Not Replace the Object: Documenting Collections to Preserve Their Context

A guide to understanding the computer as a museum-documentation tool: not as a replacement for objects, but as a means of linking provenance, conservation condition, images, movements and institutional history.

Open story

Analysis · contemporary

Preserving Music Is More Than Saving Sounds: Archives, Context and Cultural Memory

A reading of musical heritage as a set of documents, practices and social contexts. Preservation requires cataloguing, prioritising, digitising and describing material without reducing music to an isolated carrier.

Open story

Analysis · contemporary

Restoration Also Means Documentation: The Record of Every Intervention

The holdings of the Prado, MNCN-CSIC and publications from Spain’s Ministry of Culture point to an essential idea in conservation: restoration is not merely acting upon an object, but leaving a verifiable record of its condition, needs and the decisions made.

Open story

Analysis · contemporary

Cinema Does Not Live on Screen Alone: Archives, Film Libraries and Material Memory

A contextual guide to why preserving cinema does not simply mean storing films: copies, documents, posters, devices and digital formats form a heritage whose access and dissemination matter too.

Open story

Analysis · contemporary

Preserving Video Games Is Not Just About Saving Games

Museums, archives and collections show that preserving video-game history requires attention to machines, software, publications, promotional material and the cultural contexts that give them meaning.

Open story

Analysis · 1980

When Fashion Entered the Museum: Exhibition, Conservation and Cultural Context

A critical journey through clothing’s move from the historical display case to the museum as a space for contemporary culture. Using documented milestones from 1971 to 1982 and conservation criteria, this article explains what a garment can communicate, why displaying it poses material limits, and which questions remain open.

Open story

Analysis · contemporary

Digitisation Is Not Enough: The Context a Museum Must Preserve

A digital copy can broaden access to a collection, but it cannot by itself replace the documentation explaining what an object is, where it came from, and how it reached a museum. This editorial guide examines the value of metadata, archives, and digital narratives in preserving technology and material culture without losing meaning.

Open story

Analysis · contemporary

Everyday Life in the Museum: Why Context Is Preserved Too

Museum archives and collections do not only gather exceptional objects: they also make it possible to study everyday activities, customs, and relationships. Drawing on documented holdings in Spain and Latin America, this article examines what can be stated about that work and its limits.

Open story