Centre Pompidou’s Digital Art Committee to fund digital art for five years

The Centre Pompidou has set up a new patronage structure dedicated entirely to digital art, betting that private collectors and institutions will help fund a category of creative work that traditional museums have historically struggled to collect. The Paris institution announced the launch of its Digital Art Committee, a five-year initiative designed to bring together French and international patrons willing to support acquisitions, research and conservation tied to digital creation.

Key takeaways

• Centre Pompidou has created a Digital Art Committee that will run for five years.
• The committee brings together French and international patrons to fund digital art acquisitions.
• Money raised goes toward works for the Centre Pompidou-MNAM/CCI collection, plus research, exhibitions and conservation.
• Founding patrons are Ismail Tazi and Benjamin Gross.
• In 2023, Centre Pompidou became the first modern art museum to acquire blockchain-related artworks, and it has also collected virtual reality, augmented reality and artificial intelligence pieces.

Centre Pompidou launches Digital Art Committee for five years

The Digital Art Committee Centre Pompidou has just introduced is meant to last exactly five years, according to the museum’s own announcement. Rather than a permanent fixture, it functions as a defined-term mechanism built to accelerate the institution’s digital art strategy within a set window of time.

The goal, as the museum describes it, is to gather patrons — both from France and abroad — who want to accompany Centre Pompidou in its commitment to digital art and help cement its standing in that space. That framing matters: it positions the committee less as a fundraising afterthought and more as a coordinated push to secure Centre Pompidou’s competitive position in an art category that many museums worldwide are still figuring out how to collect.

Founding patrons and mission

Two names anchor the new committee at launch: Ismail Tazi and Benjamin Gross are listed as founding patrons. Their involvement gives the initiative an initial base of private support before the museum works to broaden the group with additional French and international backers over the coming years.

Financing acquisitions and supporting digital art

At its core, the committee exists to pay for artworks entering Centre Pompidou’s permanent holdings. It finances the acquisition of works destined for the Centre Pompidou-MNAM/CCI collection, giving curators a dedicated funding channel specifically earmarked for digital and new media pieces rather than competing with general acquisition budgets.

That financial role is only part of the mandate. The committee also backs the broader ecosystem around digital art — supporting publications, research programs and exhibitions that help place newly acquired works in context for the public.

Promotion, research and conservation

Beyond buying and showing art, the committee is also tasked with a less visible but arguably more critical job: conservation. Digital and computer-based works often require specialized upkeep that differs sharply from caring for paintings or sculpture, and the committee is designed to assist with those conservation operations as pieces age or as the technology behind them evolves.

A long history with computer-assisted art

None of this emerges out of nowhere. Centre Pompidou frames the new committee as a continuation of a commitment to computer-assisted creation that began in 1975. In 1975, the museum established the Atelier de Recherches en Techniques Avancées (A.R.T.A), an information laboratory aimed at both visual artists and the general public. Through Ircam, the institution also played a role in developing computer music during that same era.

From A.R.T.A to early computer art collections

That historical foundation feeds directly into present-day curatorial work. Centre Pompidou continues to research the earliest decades of computer-created art, a process that has allowed works from the 1960s through the 1990s to enter the permanent collection — often with support from the Friends of the Centre Pompidou, the museum’s longstanding patron network.

Recent milestones: blockchain, VR and AI acquisitions

It was in 2023 that the story took its most eye-catching turn, as Centre Pompidou became the first museum of modern and contemporary art to add a collection of blockchain-based works to its holdings. That single move set it apart from peer institutions still hesitant to formally collect crypto-native art, and the museum says it remains active in that area.

Since then, the collection has continued to grow along that line. Works by Robert Alice have entered the holdings, alongside pieces by Rhea Myers and Anna Ridler, plus a donated collection of generative works by Tyler Hobbs. In parallel, the New Media collection acquired its first pieces made with virtual reality — by Hayoun Kwon and Jeanne Suspuglas — and augmented reality, represented by Hito Steyerl, again with backing from the Friends of the Centre Pompidou.

KADIST partnership and AI acquisitions

Artificial intelligence forms the newest strand of this expansion. A multi-year partnership with KADIST led Centre Pompidou through a sustained reflection on AI in art, resulting in several acquisitions in the field, including work by Éric Baudelaire and by Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst.

Taken together, these acquisitions suggest a museum trying to build institutional authority across several emerging technologies at once — blockchain, VR, AR and AI — rather than betting on a single trend. For patrons and collectors watching the digital art market, that breadth signals where curatorial credibility is being staked out next, and the new committee gives that strategy a dedicated funding vehicle for the next five years.

FAQ

What is the Digital Art Committee at Centre Pompidou?

It is a five-year initiative gathering French and international patrons to support digital art acquisitions, promotion, research, exhibitions, and conservation.

What role does the Digital Art Committee play in art acquisitions?

The committee finances the acquisition of works for the Centre Pompidou-MNAM/CCI collection.

What milestones has Centre Pompidou achieved in digital art?

In 2023, it became the first modern art museum to acquire blockchain-related artworks and has acquired works using virtual and augmented reality.

How does Centre Pompidou support digital and new media art historically?

Since 1975, with the Atelier de Recherches en Techniques Avancées (A.R.T.A) and Ircam, and through research on computer-created art from the 1960s to the 1990s.

Article produced with the assistance of artificial intelligence and reviewed by the editorial team.