Voicing the Archive stems from the desire to unite and record fragmented and sometimes distant identities, bringing them together to produce often spatial and timeless dialogues and exchanges. By so doing, the intention is to create new approaches and perspectives in archiving, allowing us to reflect critically and in-depth on the search for its ontology.
The archive symbolises a portal capable of uniting and mixing different realities, allowing for new fusions and connections in a continuous evolution. It is a physical and personal place, it is memory, power, public and private dimension; an alternative source of inspiration to the traditions and memories of the world, and it is here that the unceasing stratification and de-stratification of time can offer new possibilities for change. Archiving can be a participatory device of reinterpretation and subversion, which allows history to be rewritten by giving voice to unrealised futures and unfinished pasts.
The May 9 opening will be accompanied by a series of performances taking place in the Spazio Lab and Giardino di Triennale Milano. On May 16, the final event will see a public and immersive speech about the possibilities of the archive. Here, the exhibition concept and the emerging artists’ practices will be explored through seven focuses. NABA students and alumni will describe the plurality of meanings. They will explore the deepness of the lake – the metaphor at the core of the exhibition project. Such a lake hides, reveals, guards, sediments and raises non-linear fragments to tell and rewrite history. Next to it, Marco Scotini will present L’inarchiviabile. L’archivio contro la storia (Meltemi editore) in a dialogue with Luca Cerizza, curator, art critic and NABA lecturer, and Luca Vitone, artist and NABA lecturer..
Voicing the Archive comes from a draft of Andris Brinkmanis (Bachelor of Arts in Painting and Visual Arts Course Leader at NABA) and Marco Scotini (Visual Arts Department Head at NABA).
The works of art are by BA in Painting and Visual Arts students and MA in Visual Arts and Curatorial Studies students from NABA, from both Milan and Rome campus.