Frances Liddell

The Crypto-Museum: Investigating the impact of blockchain and NFTs on digital ownership, authority, and authenticity in museums

Supervisors

• Dr Kostas Arvanitis
• Dr Guyda Armstrong
• Ian Lindsay, National Museums Liverpool

Overview of PhD

I am working on a collaborative project with the National Museums Liverpool to explore how we can implement blockchain technology to cultivate collective ownership and enchainment between the museum and its audiences. Blockchain is often only considered as a digital money infrastructure. This research seeks to demonstrate how the technology can be used beyond this monetary approach and highlight how blockchain can be used to form social value for the museum through collective ownership.

Taking a shared authority approach, the project therefore asks whether and how blockchain-enabled objects (also known as cryptocollectibles or non-fungible tokens (NFTs)) can be used as a way to highlight the different narratives of a museum object and help to build a stronger sense of community between the museum and the different stakeholders of an object.

The key themes of my research include ownership and psychological ownership, shared and open authority, and authenticity.

Biography

On completing my BA (Hons) in History of Art & Visual Studies here at the University of Manchester, I continued my studies with the MA in Arts Management, Policy and Practice. My dissertation explored the concerns and opportunities of an OpenGLAM policy for the arts sector, for which my PhD is a development from this idea. My interests are in internet culture, digital heritage and blockchain technology.

Publications

• Liddell (2021) 'Building Shared Guardianship through Blockchain Technology and Digital Museum Objects. Museum & Society Special Issue: Digital (and) Materiality in Museums , 19(2), pp. 220–236. doi:10.29311/mas.v19i2.3495.
• Ho, Vollmer, Pini, Liddell & Diprose (2021) EVA Conference Research Workshop Proceedings Research Workshop Collected Paper: Explorations in concepts and the visual arts’. doi:10.14236/ewic/EVA2021.46.

Online Articles

• Forthcoming (December 2021) 'What Makes a Museum Object NFT Valuable Beyond the Scope of the Technology?' Artnome, 5^th May 2021 ‘Rethinking Digital Originality’ Flash-Art Special Issue: Crypto Art
• 'Bridging the Gap through Crypto-Connections', Women in Blockchain Talks 24^th April 2021
• 'Disrupting the Art Museum Now!: Responding to the NFT Social Experiment', Cultural Practices 16^th March 2021

Presentations

• 'Blockchain and Digital ‘Thingness’: Exploring the Opportunities and Risks for Museums', EVA Research Workshop, 5^th – 7^th July 2021
• 'Crypto-Connecting Audiences: Could NFTs change how we consider ownership and connection in museums?' Centre of Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage, University of Leeds, 23^rd June 2021
• 'Permeance & Provenance: Exploring blockchain’s challenge to authenticity in the digital museum space', Digital Humanities Seminar Series, University of Manchester, 21^st October 2020
• 'Tokens of Connection: Exploring How Cryptocollectibles Can Be Made Meaningful', Exploring Blockchain in the Cultural Sector Conference (Virtual), 16^th October 2020.  
• 'Could Blockchain Change the Nature of Ownership in the Museum?', Museum and the Web (MW20) Conference 2020 (Virtual), 31^st March – 4^th April 2020
• 'Blockchain and the Museum: Turning Digital Fragmentation into Social Value', DCDC 19 Conference, 13^th-14^th November 2019, Birmingham UK 

Invited Panel Sessions

• ‘NFT – Hype or Hope?’ Afrovalley Blockchain, Digital Assets & Cryptocurrency 12^th May 2021
• ‘NFT in the Cultural and Creative Sectors’ DeFi Summit, 14^th – 18^th June 2021
• ‘NFTs and Museums’ CADAF Conference, 17^th – 23^rd June 2021
• ‘What Can NFTs do for Museums?’ MuseumNext Digital Summit, 30^th June 2021
• ‘NFT Panel’ EVA Conference 5^th – 7^th July 2021
• ‘Why you need to know about NFTs’ Museum Association Conference, 8^th – 10^th November 2021
• ‘Non-Fungible Wat Now!? Everything you don’t know about NFT Art’ ARCS Conference 8^th – 19^th November

Other Projects

Collaboration Labs Knowledge Exchange Project: ‘Developing Digital Engagement with the British Library. A project that aimed to identify the barriers to digital engagement and opportunities to widen access to the British Library’s digital collections with a specific focus on Kenya, South Africa, Nigeria & Uganda. 

Contact

Email: frances.liddell@postgrad.manchester.ac.uk

Twitter: @FrancesLiddell