I thought that cropping the images beyond recognition and creating categories that are no longer related to their origins was a good way to subvert the implied intelligence and authority of an archive.
It’s now been 2 weeks since I have tried to discuss my take on the project with Vid, with inconclusive results. I have a confusing sense that I’m missing something that he is looking for.
Time is flying and I need to be working on this, but don’t want to waste my time if I’m not on track.
I guess my track is based on pointing to the utter subjectivity and non-definable/controlable use of what may seem to be obvious and literal archival information. There is no right way to use archives, no inherent integrity once it moves into someone else’s hands, and no way to organize it “authentically” without knowing the original use or intent of the material. Was it sincere, or a satire? Is it true or fabricated? Like Bateson’s wink, context is everything when it comes to interpretation and meaning.
Once an archive is cut off from the creators’ or archivists’ intentions, it is open to any use, any permutation, deformation, or untruth may be derived or implied. Categories are most meaningful when searching for things. End uses may defy both intentions and categorizations.
The ideas that have come up in class around memorials (the disappearing one in particular) have been fascinating, as has been the concept that the mass of an archive depersonalizes and thereby neutralizes trauma, but I don’t yet see a connection between a project for these images and those themes.
Maybe something new will occur to me this week.
