To borrow the title of Sara Rajaei’s 2015 work, There was the dream and there was a memory connected with it, LI-MA inhabits that very intersection, where memory is not simply preserved, but activated, reimagined, and shared. Like dreams and memories, media art is fragile. Yet through thoughtful conservation, open access, and cross-generational dialogue, LI-MA ensures that what once felt ephemeral remains visible and vital. In a rapidly evolving digital landscape, LI-MA’s mission is not only to safeguard the technical integrity of media artworks, but to ensure that the contexts embedded within them remain legible and alive for future generations.

Access as Preservation: Mediakunst.net

As a centre for expertise, LI-MA is an active, collaborative force, shaping how media art is remembered, accessed, and carried into the future. This work is not abstract. It is tangible, physical, and often personal. For example, through restoring the buzz of a forgotten installation, reactivating decades-old digital code, and linking curators to a work that was once considered lost or inaccessible.

The past 12 and a half years have made clear: preservation is about building bridges between disciplines, institutions, generations, and futures and developing stewardship rooted in generosity and connection. One clear expression of this ethos is mediakunst.net, a platform that radically reframes access to media art. 

By uniting the collections of institutions such as the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Van Abbemuseum, Frans Hals Museum, and the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands, alongside LI-MA’s, mediakunst.net provides a shared space: over thousands of works by more than 900 artists are available to explore. For scholars, curators, educators, and artists, it serves as both an invaluable resource and a living archive of media art’s past and present.

Beyond offering visibility into individual works, mediakunst.net traces the broader history of media art in the Netherlands and beyond. Visitors can navigate through curated selections of pioneering and contemporary media art, featuring both Dutch and international artists such as Marina Abramović, Charles Atlas, Paul McCarthy, Bruce Nauman, Ed Atkins, Rineke Dijkstra, Wendelien van Oldenborgh, and Melanie Bonajo.

This shared access is important because it reshapes how media art is preserved, understood, and activated across time and context. Access lies at the heart of preserving media art. Platforms like mediakunst.net are crucial because they break down institutional silos and open up shared collections to a broad public and professional audience. This kind of access is vital for ensuring that media artworks – often ephemeral, complex, or hard to exhibit – remain visible, contextualised, and relevant. It allows artists, scholars, educators, and curators to explore and activate these works across different settings and generations. In doing so, access becomes a form of preservation: it keeps works alive by keeping them in use, in dialogue, and in circulation.

Presentation in Times of Crisis: LI-MA Online

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the closure of exhibitions and restrictions on physical gatherings prompted LI-MA to adapt its programming to ensure continued engagement with media art and its critical discourse. To that end, LI-MA launched a weekly online programme, offering live talks, digital tours, and curated video content, taking place every Wednesday. This move not only responded to immediate restrictions but also opened new avenues for access, extending LI-MA’s reach beyond geographic and physical constraints. 

The series featured a diverse range of events, from Diana McCarty’s exploration of techno-feminism and Joan Heemskerk’s conversation with Heath Bunting, to artist talks by Lyubov Matyunina and Harm van den Dorpel, and thematic screenings such as Communication Hiccups and Critical Code. Special collaborations, like the Cultural Matter series with Rafaël Rozendaal and Michael Connor, and the media-archival spotlights with partners such as V2_, STEIM, and IMPAKT, further emphasised the importance of digital platforms as spaces for collective reflection, preservation, and participation. Through this pivot, LI-MA demonstrated that access is not just about availability, but about reimagining the infrastructures of visibility and interaction in times of crisis and beyond.

Cultivating the Future

Whether through features that amplify underexplored practices, collaborative catalogues, or public programmes that bring media art into view for new audiences, LI-MA places visibility at the heart of its mission. For 12 and a half years, our work has been grounded in the interconnectedness of care, access, and meaning – always with the aim of keeping media art seen, shared, and significant.

To carry this work forward, LI-MA is launching Living Media Art, a new online platform designed by and for the media art community. Rooted in Amsterdam and expanding through international collaboration, the platform is a dynamic space for making media art visible: a site to share knowledge, ask questions, and spotlight evolving projects. By extending the principles of collective care and open access, it invites artists, conservators, scholars, and institutions to reimagine how media art can be preserved by keeping it in view, whether that is in discourse, in practice, or in public consciousness.

As we celebrate this milestone, we also invite you to support the future of media art with us. Help us continue our mission to connect, conserve, and champion media art in all its forms.

Header: Mediakunst.net.