living archives

Living archives is the format we turn to when the memory of a place is at risk of disappearing, being scattered, or being told only through official documents. Demolitions, residents being relocated, renovation programs, the loss of places where people come together, rapid changes in how spaces are used, or the aging of the people who hold that memory sometimes make the work urgent.

For us, an archive is not a neutral object. It always results from choices: what is collected, what is named, what is kept, what is made public, and what is left out of the frame. So the project starts by mapping the issues and the people involved: Which stories are already documented? Which voices are missing? Which places are going to change? Who can decide how the material will be used in the future?

Collecting draws on many different sources. Interviews, portraits, soundscapes, contemporary photographs, films, maps, texts, objects, and family archives help connect individual memory with collective history. A private image is never treated as mere material that is free to use: its context, its captions, the people who hold it, and the terms for reproducing it are all carefully discussed.

The intergenerational dimension is often central. Younger people photograph the neighborhood as they live it today; older residents talk about the changes, the old ways of getting together, stories of arrival, struggles, and habits that have disappeared. These exchanges bring out both the continuities and the gaps between generations, without locking elders into the past or young people into the present alone.

A living archive is also built through editing and curating. Piling up files is not enough. Participants select, caption, date, link, and organize the material. They can create before-and-after trails, timelines, maps through time, sound portraits, a documentary, an exhibition, or a booklet. Giving the material shape makes the archive understandable and gives it someone to speak to.

Questions of rights and governance are part of the project. We distinguish between what can be exhibited, what can be kept but not shared publicly, and what must stay private. With our partners, we look for a place or an arrangement that can ensure preservation and access: a neighborhood organization, a library, a community museum, a public archive, a dedicated website, or an exhibition that can be restaged.

Sharing an archive back does not turn memory into nostalgia. It connects the past, the present, and the choices to come. An archive can help pass on a local history, support people through a relocation, feed a discussion about redevelopment, reaffirm collective pride, or bring to light experiences missing from dominant narratives. It stays alive when the community can add to it, discuss it, and put it to new use.

Depending on the situation, the project can take the form of a light-touch collection, a workshop running over several months, or an observatory of lived experience that follows a transformation over several years. Time makes it possible to return to the same places, find the same people again, add new layers, and document not only what disappears but also what takes shape anew.