Fortresses with open doors

To enter an archive is to enter a fortress. You might have been invited in or even gotten a key, but the openness is only selective and temporary.

We think of archiving an inward movement: finding things, bringing them together, sorting them, and guarding them in a safe and stable place. The model of this type of archiving is the fortress. This model already provides a clear sense of the limits of the archive: fire, flooding, and data loss.

Can we think of the archive differently?

How can we manage the contradictions between conservation and accessibility?

There is another way of archiving: to use things, bring them into circulation, and distribute them (in all senses of the word). A process that operates based on projecting films, sharing spread-sheets, scanning books, printing objects, uploading mixtapes.

In the seminar, we will read, discuss, do, write, watch, listen and create a publication together. The outcome will be a publication.