Agonistic Intelligence/s public talk: Annet Dekker

Agonistic Intelligence/s (or another AI/s) is a Summer School by the Museum of Impossible Forms (MIF) in partnership with Helsinki Art Museum (HAM) for Helsinki Biennial 2023. It is curated by Ali Akbar Mehta. 

Agonistic Intelligence/s (or another AI/s) is a gathering of invited provocateurs, guest speakers, and participants to form a research-led working group that engages with a shortlisted selection of the HAM art collection as a key focal node and as an archival site of inquiry. The working group convenes for an intensive 6-day period during the Helsinki Biennial 2023, from August 14-19, 2023, at HAM Helsinki Art Museum, with open-to-public evening lectures and discussion programs.

Read more about the programme here!

Annet Dekker:
The politics of access within archiving as artistic praxis

Thu 17.8. at 18:00 in HAM hall, HAM Helsinki Art Museum (Eteläinen rautatiekatu 8).

You can register to attend to the event here!

If you cannot attend in person, you can watch the stream here!

How does an archive live up to its own values and aims in regard to collecting and collection management, especially in relation to access? The digitization of archives and the massive use of the Internet have potentially increased access to the archive and its contents, as well as facilitated the usage of information in the archive.

However, creating access doesn’t necessarily mean that records become accessible. The tension between access and accessibility will be addressed by taking up three challenges that archival organisations are confronted with, but which often remain implicit: 1. standardization as a pre-condition for understandable exchange of information; 2. contextualization as a way to make sense of data; 3. collaboration as a means to involve users.

Rather than focusing on the challenges within archival institutions, and in an attempt to appreciate the tension, in her presentation Annet Decker will focus on archival alternatives that may lead to surprising or new insights when considering what it means to provide access.

Annet Dekker is an independent researcher and curator. She is Assistant Professor Archival Science at the University of Amsterdam and Visiting Lecturer at London South Bank University. Previously she was Researcher Digital Preservation at Tate, London, tutor at Piet Zwart Institute, Rotterdam, and Fellow at The New Institute, Rotterdam. She initiated aaaan.net with Annette Wolfsberger in 2009; they coordinate artists-in-residences and set up strategic and sustainable collaborations with national and international arts organisations. Previously she worked as Web curator for SKOR (Foundation for Art and Public Domain, 2010–12), was programme manager at Virtueel Platform (2008–10), and head of exhibitions, education and artists-in-residence at the Netherlands Media Art Institute (1999–2008). Together with Annette Wolfsberger, she produced Funware, an international touring exhibition in 2010 and 2011 about fun in software (curated by Olga Goriunova). In 2014, she completed her PhD under the supervision of Matthew Fuller on the conservation of net art at Goldsmiths University of London, Enabling the Future, or How to Survive FOREVER. A study of networks, processes and ambiguity in net art and the need for an expanded practice of conservation.

The events will be streamed online. The link to the stream will be shared here.