Abstract- The Migration and Preservation of Media

We have today the possibility to emphasize the continuity of classical visual arts and media art. Combining both we could say that media art is a new branch at the tree of art, but that this new branch changes also the tree of art. The field of media is a merging between science, technology and art. Therefore the term science has to be expanded to the natural sciences. The Science of the Image has to include the images of Science.
But we have also to separate f.e. the idea of the image from the technical carrier of the image in that sense the painting is also a technical carrier, a medium of the image, that changes through history from the cave painting to easel painting. The next medium is photography and the other media are film, video, computer etc. but each time when the idea of the image finds a new technical carrier, a new medium, it acquires also new features. Only the digital image can be interactive. So we see the migration of the image through different media, media are changing guest media of the image. Thereby each change of the medium transforms also the concept and the options of the image.
Media Art and the aspects of documentation/collection/ preservation have to be seen together as culture and culture technics. Our task is to prevent the works of art to vanish. Therefore the hardware and the software of media art must be collected by the museums but also the documentation and other archive material and therefore we need trained experts who are able to perform the score. So we have to collect in media art the original tools for which the pieces have been conceived. Or to have a hardware to which the original pieces can be adapted. The software, the information, the score must be carried on from each new technical carrier to the newest one. Digitalization seems to be at the moment the most sustainable storage. Digital heritage and infinite storage are keywords to these problems.