Rekall - An open-source environment to document, analyze and simplify the restaging of time based media artworks.

Abstract

With the emergence of huge digitalized datasets and digital corpora, we now frequently come across very large amounts of data, challenging existing research methodologies and expectations - especially as regards to the history of the arts and the study of creative processes. How can we manage all the Big Data related issues raised by exponential production of digital documents by artists ? How do we work our way through hundreds, sometimes thousands of documents to reconstitute and analyze creative processes? We have chosen to enhance the classic video annotation model with innovative graphical tools, based on the analysis of all the metadata hidden inside the heterogeneous documents of a corpus. Rekall, an open-source working environment, reveals the richness and the complexity of artistic creation by providing a new method of genetic analysis. Through metadata, the graphical visualization of documents, the links between them and various selection of contexts, Rekall opens an extremely wide field of analytical possibilities for researchers and for artists. The aim is not to freeze documents but rather to trigger a dynamic documentation process that can be enriched, enhanced, refined, based on the contribution of artists, their teams and researchers. The polysemic interpretation of documents opens the way to a re-interpretation of works, in the perspective of their adaptations, re-staging or re-enactment. Rekall is designed for stage managers, artists, historians, conservators, teachers and publishers.