Colloquium: “Ruins in the archive: constructing visual histories in photography and broadcast media”

THURSDAY 14 NOVEMBER 10.00–18.00
British School in Rome
Via Antonio Gramsci 61
00197 Roma
This one-day colloquium will engage with visual archives in response to either loss or potential loss due to the destruction of war. The colloquium proceeds in terms of four thematics: Entering the Archive, Interpreting the Archive, Narrating the Archive and Playing the Archive. Discussing historical examples of visual archives compiled in times of crisis allows for approaching also the question of archives of current conflicts and adequate responses by academic communities.
Organised by Joanne Anderson (Warburg Institute), Mick Finch (Central Saint Martins, UAL) and Johannes von Müller (Bilderfahrzeuge Project) as part of the AHRC funded project, A vision for Europe: Academic Responsibility and Action in Times of Crises .
For full programme, please click here
The exhibition, Ruins in the Archive (14 – 27 November 2019) will be open during the conference and will be a reference for the proceedings. On display are photographs Helmut Gernsheim made of important London monuments for the National Buildings Record to document them in case of their destruction during World War II, and John Bryan Ward-Perkins photographs of war damaged Italian buildings and monuments, also taken during World War II. The material respectively represents holdings from the Photographic Collections of the Warburg Institute and the British School at Rome. This motif of documentary response to the threat of destruction and actual damage closely relates to the aim of A vision for Europe; to explore historical examples of academic responses to archives as well as through archives in times of crisis and also to look to the future and ask the question of how academic communities can be effective in our times?
Ruins in the Archive Exhibition