The archive is often thought of as a forgotten repository of faded documents and dusty objects: it is an image of and from the past, a mundane picture whose identity is slowly transforming into a dynamic, digitally coloured notion of storage and memory. The archive, as an innovative concept, need not embody the past as such, but rather the promise of the past into the future.
Its essence is to be found in the way it addresses yesterday’s potential, opening up to the unknown, the unexpected and unpredictable, and to a new future.
With that in mind Argos opens its doors and its archive with the project Open Archive #1. Argos’ extensive collections are both a starting-point for genealogy and archaeology, as well as sparking off a multitude of associations and correlations.
From the numerous media works, catalogues and publications several trajectories can be drawn, and diverse frames of reference for reflections on culture, art, media and society today can be created. In this way the archive is used as a public space, which does not merely take stock of the past and classify it, but reinterprets and re-activates it as well.
Dealing with a collection in a dynamic way opens up new possibilities: it is both a quest through memory, as well as one for content and contextual correlations. The numerous programme segments during Open Archive #1 do not merely highlight Argos’ points of strength – the domain of audiovisual art – they also present new perspectives and challenges.
A varied and lively complementary programme of lectures, performances, concerts, screenings and artists’ presentations has been setup to create a discursive space which negotiates some of the key questions in audio-visual culture today.
Opening Sat 29.09.07 // 18:00 + BOOK LAUNCH The Residents (within the Nuit Blanche 2007)
MEDIA LOUNGE
– RE:COLLECTIONS : ACQUISITIONS 2005-2007
– OUT OF PLACE : PERFORMING THE EVERYDAY Curated by Vincent Meessen
– UP TO, AND INCLUDING THE LIMITS Curated by Katerina Gregos
VIDEO VORTEX : RESPONSES TO YOUTUBE CONFERENCE
Fri 05.10.2007 // 11:00 – 19:00 (+ screenings at 20:30)
With NORA BARRY, JOHAN GRIMONPREZ, PETER HORVATH, LEV MANOVICH, ANA KRONSCHNABL & TOMAS RAWLINGS, ADRIAN MILES, SIMON RUSCHMEYER, KEITH SANBORN, PETER WESTENBERG
Moderated by Geert Lovink (Institute of Network Cultures)
MEDIA, MEMORY AND THE ARCHIVE CONFERENCE
Sa 06.10.2007 // 11:00 – 19:00
With JOSEPHINE BOSMA, JEAN-FRANCOIS BLANCHETTE, STEVE DIETZ, WOLFGANG ERNST, CHARLIE GERE, OLIVER GRAU, RICHARD RINEHART
Moderated by Marleen Wynants (CROSSTALKS, Vrije Universiteit Brussel – VUB)
CINEMA IN TRANSIT – LECTURE SERIES
– Fri 12.10.2007 // 20:30: Philippe-Alain Michaud
– Fri 19.10.2007 // 20:30: Mark Nash
– Fri 26.10.2007 // 20:30: Laura Mulvey
– Fri 02.11.2007 // 20:30: Peter Weibel
– Fri 09.11.2007 // 20:30: Jean-Christophe Royoux
WAYS OF HEARING
Concerts & Lecture
– Thu 04.10.2007 // 20:30
CONCERT Charles Curtis + Eliane Radigue / Lucio Capece + Mika Vainio
Co-production with Q-O2
– Thu 17.10.2007 // 20:30
LECTURE David Toop: Ways of Hearing, Resisting the Visual
– Thu 18.10.2007 // 20:30
CONCERT Asmus Tietchens + Thomas Köner, John Duncan, CM von Hausswolff
Co-production with Metaphon
– Thu 25.10.2007 // 20:30
CONCERT Tetuzi Akiyama + Jozef van Wissem / Mattin + Junko + Michel Henritzi
Co-production with (K-RAA-K)3
INDETERMINATE CINEMA
Ken Jacobs & Tony Conrad
MEDIA MATTERS
perspectives on production, distribution and preservation of media based arts