How is an architectural model consolidated and re-assembled in conservation to be able to continue to communicate a design concept? How does the work of care and preservation of models reveal knowledge about the often taken-for-granted dynamics of creative processes? To provide answers, this article draws on Etienne Souriau’s philosophy of creativity and follows how the ‘modes of existence’ of creative works are re-enacted in the anaphoric progression of conservation. Basing her findings on ethnography at the Canadian Centre for Architecture, the author examines the epistemic complexity of specific situations of assessing, preserving and assembling large complex scale models. Unpacking the specificity of model conservation, it is argued, allows us to challenge two established beliefs on creativity: the myth of the stable ontology of historically valuable cultural objects and the myth of teleology of creative processes. Conservation-in-action demonstrates the subtle mechanics of crafting historiographic knowledge in the arts.

如何在保护中合并和重新组装建筑模型，以便能够继续传达设计概念？维护和模型保存工作如何揭示有关创作过程通常被认为是必要的动态的知识？为了提供答案，本文借鉴了艾蒂安·苏里乌（Etienne Souriau）的创造哲学，并探讨了如何在保护性的照应性过程中重新制定创意作品的“生存方式”。基于她在加拿大建筑中心的人种志研究成果，作者考察了评估，保存和组装大型复杂模型的特定情况的认识论复杂性。有人认为，解开模型保存的特殊性使我们可以挑战关于创造力的两种既定信念：具有历史价值的文化对象的稳定本体的神话和创作过程的目的论的神话。行动中的保存展示了艺术史学中技巧的微妙机制。