“My house became an archive” is a five-day-long workshop conceived by Luise Malmaceda and Mónica Ramirez in partnership with The Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural and Educational Center as part of the The Latinx Project’s Public Humanities Fellowship. It aims to reflect on non-institutionalized forms of memory by proposing creative experimentations with personal archives. Participants will bring their personal archives to design an emotional map/plan of their homes, where they can locate, spatialize, and critically think about their memories as both a site of personal and collective history. The workshop includes discussion sessions about representation, creative mapping, ancestry and fabulation, and conversations with Latinx artists and activists working at the intersections of art and memory/art and archives.
When: August 8 to August 12; from 6:00pm to 8:30pm
Where: The Clemente Sóto Vélez Cultural Center – Room 309
Estimate number of participants: 10 to 12
Public: 18+ years
Materials: The workshop includes a toolkit that will be distributed in the first meeting
OPEN CALL:
We have always been told that history is constructed from the archives, but what happens with our personal histories? Many of us have visited an archive looking for our histories only to find gaps and silences. On the other hand, sometimes our houses are filled with objects that reveal those histories, only in a different way. Where do we place those memories we believe are too personal or too particular to be part of a collective history?
If you want to creatively think together about personal archives and design an emotional map/plan of your home, we invite you to be a part of this workshop. Anyone interested in the workshop should bring whatever they believe to be their personal archive (there is no limit) and send 250 words explaining why this workshop would be helpful to analyze their personal archives.
Attention: Participants must be able and confirm their commitment to attend all five days from August 8 to August 12.
Submit a 250-word letter of intent by July 30 to:
lbm2138@columbia.edu
mar2345@columbia.edu