Towards the Immigrant Archive

A project by Alla Efimova and Svetlana Boym

Artists, writers, and scholars who have addressed the issues of memory and exile in their work are invited to offer projects and reflections on building the immigrant archive. All projects will be posted on The Archive web site for public commentary and discussion. Selected projects will form a basis for an installation and a symposium.

The following questions are offered for projects and discussion:

How to imagine a new kind of archive that doesn't merely preserve and classify the past but opens it to the present?

How are memories and memorabilia of exile and diaspora to be archived? Can there be a poly-cultural archive that represents experience of cultural transition and migration?

Does a diasporic and a Jewish archive present special problems?

What artifacts are eligible for archiving? What is the status of material objects versus visual and textual documents?

How can an archive question itself? What alternative ways of organizing the immigrant archive would you propose?

Artists, writers, and scholars to be approached for participation:

Julia Kristeva	Leslie Camhi
Jacques Derrida	James Clifford
Tsvetan Todorov	Shimon Attie
Ilya Kabakov	Sidra Ezrahi
Vitaly Komar and Alexander Melamid	Annette Michelson
Eva Hoffman	Krzysztof Wodiczko
Chantal Ackerman	Marina Temkina
Christian Boltanski