aura

from collector to curator

by Michael Shanks

This is one of a series of comments on the 8th biennial symposium “Connoisseurship and the Collectible Car” held at the Revs Institute for Automotive Research in Naples, Florida in March 2015. [Link] Cars are changing – robots are on their way. And car collecting is changing. [Link] While training as an architect Nick became…

history’s ruin – the case of an automobile

by Michael Shanks

This is one of a series of comments on the 8th biennial symposium “Connoisseurship and the Collectible Car” held at the Revs Institute for Automotive Research in Naples, Florida in March 2015. [Link] I’m in a workshop at the Revs Institute in Naples Florida, home of Miles Collier’s remarkable collection of cars and all things…

Revs at Pebble Beach Concours

by Michael Shanks

Yesterday was the culmination of ME200 – a class at Stanford concerned with the historical significance of things. With about 30 students last term Reilly (Brennan), Jon (Feiber) David (Kelley), and I explored how cars connect with history. The objective – to judge which of the cars entered for the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance was…

Thessaloniki – physiognomy

by Michael Shanks

Mike Pearson and I have started a new collaboration around theatre/archaeology – the rearticulation of fragments of the past as real time event – [Link] to a prospectus. As part of this revival I am reviewing some of my photography projects from the last three decades, explaining and adding commentary. Many are at archaeographer.com. I…

automotive archaeology and the physiognomy of a car

by Michael Shanks

Fred Simeone’s new book about the conservation and preservation of cars is out today, launched at Bonhams’s “Preserving the Automobile” auction at the Simeone Foundation Automotive Museum, Philadelphia, – [Link]. Fred is prompting a reevaluation of car collecting with his support for sensitive preservation rather than restoration. There have been two preservation classes of cars…