From June 27 to October 21, the European University will host the exhibition “Home Archive: Why Do We Keep It?”. The project was prepared by the Curatorial Circle of the EUSP School of Arts and Cultural Heritage in collaboration with the “Lived” Center for the Study of Ego Documents.
The exhibition is dedicated to the phenomenon of domestic, family and private collections and archives, which preserve not only the memory of people and events, but also traces of everyday life, personal experience, feelings and attachments. Together with the “Survived” researchers, we suggest looking at these fragile forms of memory and asking a seemingly simple but really important question: what, how, and why do we store it?
The home archive is neither an institutional collection nor a scientific foundation. It can include letters, photographs, notebooks, things and documents that accumulate spontaneously, haphazardly, according to the strange logic of individual significance. This memory is compressed in layers — vulnerable, fragmentary, and dear to its owners. What happens when these past testimonies lose touch with their custodians? How can we work with such archives without losing their human dimension? What questions and problems does the home archive pose to researchers and institutions? The exhibition invites us to reflect on the complex work of preserving, understanding and representing private memory.
To visit the exhibition during the event, you need to register for Timepad. The European University has an access regime: when registering, enter your full name as on your passport and bring your identity card with you.
In September The exhibition will be available on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 15:00 to 18:00.
Address: European University, ul. Shpalernaya Street, 1, 3rd floor.
The curatorial club is the student exhibition laboratory of the School of Arts and Cultural Heritage of the European University.
Parallel program
We invite you to take part in the parallel program of the exhibition “Home Archive: Why Do We Keep It?”!
The School of Arts and Cultural Heritage, together with the “Survived” Center for the Study of Ego Documents, have prepared a program of mediation, lectures, reading groups, as well as a board game based on materials from the “Lived” archives. You have the opportunity not only to visit the exhibition, but also to participate in live discussions, joint reading of texts and experimental formats that help you better understand the topic of home archives.
Reading groups
The program will start with a reading group (shared reading) on Thursday September 25, online. We will read the text “We Are What We Keep: The Family Archive, Identity and Public/Private Heritage” research by a research team that included Anna Woodman, Laura King, Liz Gloin, Vicki Crew, and Fiona Blair. The study conducted by these authors using the focus group method is devoted to the peculiarities of the very phenomenon of home archives and the specifics of the “curatorial” practices implemented when creating and storing them.
The group will be led by Maria Guryeva, Associate Professor at the School of Arts and Cultural Heritage; Pavel Sharkov, a graduate student at the School; and Tatyana Vostroilova, a graduate student at the School.
September 30 at 6:30pm (also online) we will read and discuss with Tatyana Mironova a fragment of her book “The optics of documentation. Practices of working with history and memory in contemporary art”
October 9 at 6:30pm (online) we discuss the text Richard Chalfen Snapshots “r” us: the evidentiary problematic of home media. This text is not about the family archive as such; it is about the methodology for studying both the “home” documents themselves (in this case photographs) and the practices in which these documents arise and circulate.
The registration link will appear later.
Anyone can participate subject to the following conditions:
- Register to participate in the seminar on Timepad. Participation is free, but group size is limited — make decisions responsibly
- Participants need to read the text and be ready to talk about it — the meeting will be arranged as a moderated discussion
- During the meeting, you will need to ensure a sufficiently good quality of communication so that you can be heard and seen
- Attending a meeting with the camera on is highly desirable
Mediations
Mediation is an interactive form of exploring an exhibition that involves free dialogue within a group. Unlike a traditional tour, participants' questions and impressions are important here, and the mediator's task is to guide and maintain the conversation.
During the mediation, we suggest that we consider together the practices of home archiving and answer the question: what, why, and how do we store it?
Mediation schedule:
- September 29, 7:00 p.m.
- October 10, 1:00 p.m.
- October 11, 12:00
- October 13, 7:00 p.m.
- October 18, 12:00
Seats are limited. Registration is required to participate on Timepad.
Board game
The School of Arts and Cultural Heritage, together with the “Survived” Center for the Study of Ego Documents, invites you to participate in experimental board game as part of a parallel program to the exhibition.
The game simulates the practice of analyzing real home archives and invites participants to think about how and why personal documents are saved.
Host — Anastasia Pavlovskaya, researcher at the “Survived” Center for the Study of Ego Documents.
Sign up to participate on Timepad.
We remind you that the European University has an access regime — when registering, enter your full name as on your passport and bring your identity card.
Follow the announcements of the parallel program events at School social media and in the rubric “Event calendar” on this site.