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News1 March, 2025
Weeks to Launch: 3
We’re back with another exciting newsletter in anticipation of AOPA-Retrospective 1.0’s elusive upcoming launch!
Last time, I introduced you to the Taxonomy Main Page and spoke about some of the ways artworks can be grouped. This week, we’re taking a look at how AOPA-Retrospective 1.0 represents artists in the About section. This page brings together in one place three important content blocks:
Presently, AOPA’s senior WordPress programmer Valeriu Tihai (who we met back in our second issue) is hard at work programming these templates. They should be done any day. In the meantime, I’ll tell you what to expect.
Oh, a little heads up… You’ll notice that we decided to use some technical images to illustrate this newsletter. They are the annotated mockups that Don prepares for Valeriu to communicate what needs to go into the programming of a template. I’m hoping that they will give you some more insight into the production process.
We would like to thank Karen Trask again for the use of her design templates for this newsletter.
BTW, if you’re getting something out of our newsletters, share our sign-up page with friends! New readers can sign up here.
Screen Capture showing the Taxonomy Themes Main Page of artist Karen Trask’s retrospective.
Montage showing the design storyboards for the three sections of Karen Trask’s About Section..
Starting with the very top of the page, the first thing users will see when they land on the About section of a Retrospective, is a portrait of the artist or another representative image or video. This could be a clip from an interview, a shot in the studio or a still from a performance, something that quickly conveys who they are. By putting a face to the name, users are set up to get to know the artist as a person and a creator.
Like other media in the AOPA-Retrospective platform, this image or video will have a caption with photo credit and a link to download the high-res version (useful for when a gallery, festival or publication needs an image for their web or print materials). Look familiar? That’s because it was modelled after the highlighted media in the Artwork Single template I introduced you to in one of our first newsletters.
Graphic layout showing the header for the About page with annotation for programming the template.
Right below the artist’s portrait are three tabs, which allow users to easily navigate the main content areas assembled on the page: Info, CV, and Contact.
Graphic layout showing the sub-navigation for the About page with annotation for programming the template.
These tab links, as well as all the content blocks I will be telling you about, only show up if there’s content in them. Furthermore, each tab has its own URL. That means if you want to share your CV with a curator, for example, you can send them directly there without having to guide them through your site. One click, and they’re in.
The “Info” section has two parts:
Graphic layout showing the bibliography and artist statement blocks of the About page with annotation for programming the blocks.
The Biography is pretty straightforward. It’s a place for artists to share their story, e.g. where they come from, and how they’ve arrived at making art. The bio is entered in a WYSIWYG text field, the length of it and how in depth you want to go are up to you.
The subheading is customizable. Although “Biography” is a classic, it could be replaced with something written in more of a headline style or injected with a personal flare. “My foray into the art world” might be more your speed, or even just “Bio” if you like to keep it short.
The Artist Statement works the same way. Artists can input their custom subheadings, a statement of their choice, and edit these text fields as needed.
While these are consistent features across most artists’ websites, AOPA has taken care to go the extra mile…
It’s not uncommon for artists to have several iterations of their Artist Statement and Bio. These are texts that are requested by galleries, for grant applications, residencies, and more, so they’ve likely been rewritten many times over.
That’s why AOPA-Retrospective 1.0 has the option to make available downloadable PDFs of documents and links for additional versions of biographies and artist statements. There could be extra-long and extra-short versions of your bio, a link to your university or gallery profile, older versions of your statement, what ever you think is worth sharing.
Examples of links to webpages and to downloads that could be used in the biography and statement blocks.
Going back to our curators, critics, art historians and collectors, or “CCACs”, these statements and detailed biographies showcase useful information about the artist. Not only do they provide the basic information about an artist’s life, experiences and artistic priorities, but they also hold a backlog of archival information centralized in one location.
Next up: the CV tab. This tab holds a lot of information, so we’re going to break it down.
Graphic layout for the CV page of Karen Trask’s website.
We’ve talked in previous weeks about the interconnections in the content put into an AOPA-Retrospective. The CV is no exception.
Major sections of the CV — Exhibitions, Publications, Collections, and Grants and Prizes — are automatically generated from selected data that was entered to create the Artwork and Exhibition pages. By entering metadata in one place, it appears in all of the other relevant spots. This way data is only entered once, which guarantees consistency across the website, while minimizing work.
To help users navigate the sometimes quite long CV page, there are anchored links that jump down to each of the CV’s main sections when clicked.
Graphic showing sub-navigation for a CV.
AOPA-Retrospective 1.0 has five different exhibition types. Each exhibition is given a type when it is created. Each type has its own grouping in the CV:
For each Exhibition entry, the system pulls from the Exhibition post the following:
A list of exhibitions is created, displayed in reverse chronological order with the most recent entries at the top.
Graphic layout showing the solo exhibition block of the About page with annotation for programming the block (note for the graphic mockup the content for this section was copied from another AOPA website and is not for Karen Trask).
This gathering of data about exhibitions and linking it to the Exhibition pages is not only useful for artists. For CCACs, this streamlines the processes of art research and fact-checking. If they find an entry that interests them, they can go directly to the exhibition, straight from the CV, to get all the details and see images. That’s more information with far fewer clicks!
The Publications portion of the CV works in much the same way. Like Exhibitions, this section is generated from what’s already been entered into the system, efficiently making data clear and consistent across all areas of the site.
AOPA-Retrospective 1.0 has 9 different types of publications, including: Books, Monographs, Exhibition Catalogs, Reviews, Articles, Pamphlets, Interviews, Dissertations and Webpages. Publication entries are sorted into these categories under their respective subheadings, depending on how each one has been categorized.
Every publication is displayed with its bibliographic reference, a link to the full-text download if it’s been uploaded to the system, as well as a link to the publication if there is one.
Graphic layout showing the Books subsection of the Publications block on the About page with annotation for programming the block.
Putting all this data into AOPA-Retrospective is a process. So, if you or your dedicated curator realize, for example, that a publication was improperly categorized, or has bibliographic information that’s not quite right, don’t worry! It will become clear when you see it compiled in the CV, and you can go to the post to make any corrections required. The publication will then automatically be sorted and displayed properly.
Graphic showing Bernard Mulaire’s arts writing website on mobile and portable screens.
Before we finish with publications, I have some inside information on a future iteration of AOPA-Retrospective… I heard from Don that AOPA has future plans for creating a “Publication Single” page so that we can also create online retrospectives for art writers! Not sure what that could look like? Check out this example of a website for art writer Bernard Mulaire made by AOPA (it was made some time back and is hand coded!).
By now, you’re probably getting the gist of things. Entries in the Collections section include the title of the collection. Note that only public collections are listed here.
Graphic layout showing the Collections block on the About page with annotation for programming the block.
Grants and Prizes are split into a Grants section and a Prizes section. The entries display the name, granting body and year awarded.
Graphic layout showing the Grants and Prizes block on the About page with annotations.
Just like in the previous sections, all of this information is generated automatically from data already input into the platform. It’s not magic — it’s just good code.
The automatically generated portion of the CV already holds a lot of information. But that doesn’t tell your whole story. Items like Teaching History, Conferences, Artist Residencies, Education and any other category can be added manually as custom sections to the CV.
Each of these sections will have a heading of your choosing, and as many entries as desired. There are data fields for a year, a description, a related document, and a related link. This makes it not only adaptable to your needs but thorough too, giving ample room for the information you consider pertinent to your curriculum vitae.
Graphic layout showing an example of the Custom CV section block with annotations.
Onto the third and final content area of the About portion of the site, the Contact tab.
You can choose to share your email, social media links, and the contact information of representatives like dealers and agents. We respect your privacy, so you need only provide the contact information you feel comfortable sharing.
Graphic layout showing the Contact section of the About page with annotations.
Before we finish, I have another inside scoop on a potential feature for a future iteration of AOPA-Retrospective I’d like to share!
With all due respect, in our system Artists are seen as data objects just like Artworks and Exhibitions. Each has their own descriptive metadata and artworks, that’s what we’ve been looking at in this newsletter. As you have seen Artist profiles are where all of their “About” information is held. That means that theoretically Retrospective can accommodate many artists in the platform.
We are currently discussing whether in a future iteration, there will be templates created for presenting websites for exhibitions with multiple artists. The artworks from several different artists can all be shown on the Exhibition Single page, as well as having pages for each artist with the artworks they presented in the show.
Graphic showing the Intercalary Event exhibition website on mobile and portable screens.
Are you interested? To get a better idea, here’s a project created by AOPA and designed by Derek Schusterbauer and Don, which could serve as the prototype. It is a virtual exhibition done for the Intercalary Art Event, which happened during the Pandemic and could not actually receive visitors because of lockdowns. Virtual exhibitions could be the future.
As always, thanks for reading! With every newsletter, I hope that AOPA-Retrospective 1.0 gets a little clearer in your mind… and that you keep getting more excited about the launch! It’s a pleasure to share the process with you.
At times, it may seem never-ending. But don’t fret! There is only one more template left to program: the “All Artworks” page. There is light at the end of the tunnel, and I’ll be here to keep you updated until we get there.
Have something to share with us? Want to pose your burning questions? Get in touch, we always love to hear from you.
Enjoying the newsletters? Share the sign-up page! It’s the best way to spread the word and get friends and colleagues up-to-date with the platform.
Mya Fernandes-Giles, AOPA Dedicated-Curator Assistant
Master’s student in Art History at Concordia University, working on a project that relies heavily on alternative archives. Has a great appreciation for record-keeping and cultural preservation, especially amongst little-known artists and communities. Recipient of the Concordia Merit Scholarship, the Guido Molinari Prize in Studio Arts and the Sarah Leaney Award in Ceramics and Fibers.
Artist Online Presence and Archiving (AOPA), provides professional online archiving and web-development services to mid- to late-career contemporary visual artists. AOPA was founded in 2023. It grew out of the freelance work of Don Goodes, who was an art critic and curator in Canada for a decade before moving over to web development in the cultural sector. AOPA delivers its services via a growing team of freelance writers, curators and designers spread across Canada. Over the past 2 years, the core team has been developing a flexible and comprehensive online platform called AOPA-Retrospective, a key tool in delivering AOPA’s services. AOPA-Retrospective is designed to fulfill the needs of contemporary artists, for both archiving and the online presentation of their oeuvre in the spirit of the catalog-raisonné.
For questions or inquiries see our contact page. We would love to hear from you.
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