1001 definitions of the Archive
Author: redactie redactie
In front of a good crowd, six researchers, hosted by David Garcia, presented their views on the phenomenon ‘Archive’. The world of Archivism has undergone a metamorphosis since the breakthrough of the Internet. While an archive used to bring up the images of dusty piles of paper safely hidden away from the general public, an archive can now imply every possible bit of information on the net. But should all these new bits and bites be called Archives? This question led to fierce discussions at the end of this session.
Unfortunately, yours truly was busy with other work at
this action packed Next Five Minutes. So he missed the
first five minutes. In those five minutes, the
speakers were introduced. They got a name. And
unfortunately some of them had a different name than
those in the festival guide. So forgive me if a name
remains an X. What is the meaning of a name anyway? It
is just a word.
Well, at least the word ‘Archive’ can mean a lot.
Andrew Orlowski for example, examines the Google
search engine as if it was an archive of the Internet.
Although it ‘only’ shows three billion out of the nine
billion available worldwide sites, it still can be
looked at as a fascinating mirror of modern web-based
life.
Archives can also be used for and as a political
statement. The performance at the MAX, and the
activities of the Speculative Archive for Historical
Clarification are perfect examples of this. Not only
did their performance on the fall of Allende have a
political meaning, in their everyday work they focus
on the political policy of the declassification of
state-archives. Unfortunately, David Thome remained
mostly silent during the session. Not ‘to be
continued’, I’m afraid.
Mrs. X did a Herculean job. With the help of some
American radical students, she managed to reconstruct
hundreds of shredded documents. This
collection/archive was supposed to be destroyed, for
political reasons. Mrs. X showed that destroying
information is an almost impossible thing to do. But
one needs loads of time and energy to do so.
Mrs. Y did not have to use glue and scissors. However,
her work is probably just as time-consuming. She
recorded every moving image of Slobodan Milosevic,
currently under trial at the international Tribunal in
The Hague. But her collection consists of earlier
information as well. Here, an archive can be used to
uncover and demystify a terrible truth, and play a
role in judgement as well.
The Internet guru/journalist Ted Byfield concluded the
presentations. He raised some important questions.
According to him it remains to be seen if search
engines like Yahoo are Archives. ‘Otherwise we would
forget what Archives used to be’, was his explanation.
Still, he is convinced that the information age
changed the information culture. Before Internet,
written information implied a slow print-culture. Now,
‘a new form of writing’ exists. Written culture has
become quicker and vaster. Loads of moves and changes
of the Internet are recorded in Archives. This
development is unique. According to Byfield, it
chances the way we deal with history.
The question what an archive should be raised a debate
during the Q&A round. Mrs. Y claimed that archives at
least should be legitimate. There should be a reason
why collections of information exist. Some people
claim that everything labeled as an archive, is an
archive. But, according to Y, ‘a list of favourite
ice-cream flavours is not an Archive’. This led to
raised hands and even some minor yelling from the
audience. Some people clearly held a different
opinion. Concluding, David Thorne claimed, that the
question what an archive is, is not that important. He
asked the panel where the ‘archive-hype’ came from.
Why is the modern world so obsessed by storing
information and calling it archive?
True answers do not exist. Still, the name issue
proved very interesting, and the debate is not
finished yet. But time was limited and the Oude Zaal
had to be left. David Garcia rounded up by claiming
that this session was not called ‘1001 definitions of
the Archive’. But maybe, it should have had that name
from the start.
Mr. Q