Case Study 4

An artist working in digital wants to make work available. They do not want them available as single items as the works are a series of videos and need to be understood as a series. The videos are however challenging for a general public audience, depicting some nudity, music containing expletives and flashing/strobe lights.

Challenging material is a difficult topic for the archive – often it is culturally sensitive as well as possibly creating a physical issue with flashing or strobe lighting.

In this instance we would not accept it because of the potential for offence and the physical effect of strobes, but we would suggest that the artist make ‘acceptable’ stills available and link to their website. We would also suggest that the website has a parental advisory notice as we are not responsible for the content of that site.

This is not to say we discourage art. We do not. We are happy to hold an artist's work and to link to their website for their more challenging works. We must work on the principle that we are a general use site, used by young people as much as adults, and as such must be cautious.