Upcoming
11 Mar 2021
Archival Absence
Video series: presentations, discussions
videolinkWhat remembrance practices do societies develop that possess no (state) archives or have no access to them? How is testimony preserved and remembered there? Does the public have a right to archives? What role do initiatives by artists, researchers and activists play?
As public institutions, archives can contribute to the development of collective memory and to the discourse on cultural and national identities. Such archival sites are often lacking in the countries of the southern Mediterranean and the Middle East: European colonial policy did not allow independent historiography in the regions, with far-reaching consequences up to the present day. Today, archives there are created and maintained mainly by private initiatives. But such collections are vulnerable and often subject to loss and destruction in the course of political conflicts.
part of The Broken Archive series – Villa Romana in cooperation with HKW funded by the Federal Foreign Office as part of The Whole Life: An Archive Project
with Bassel Al Saadi, Fehras Publishing Practices, Ghassan Halwani, United for Intercultural Action (Balint Josa) and Rona Sela, moderated by Marwa Arsanios
