Politics and Possibilities of Collage as Archive: Centering Anticolonial Methods

Session Type: Workshop

Abstract

In this workshop, facilitator-presenters will share grounding examples from four collage-as-archiving projects rooted in anti-colonial feminist, queer, and trans histories to invite participants to grapple with political and ethical tensions through collaging (no experience necessary, all are welcome and encouraged). We embrace arts-based methods–specifically physical and digital collage–to engage in counter-storytelling. We are interested in the intimate, connective work these affecting mediums can offer, while also committed to moving with care, creating particular conditions for creation and encounter that recognize ethical and political intensities. We will invite participants to collage as a process of thinking and creating through key ideas in current projects and close with a facilitated discussion about feelings, ideas, and questions that emerged in the collage-creation process.

Sub Unit

• SIG-Arts-Based Educational Research

Chair

• Wendy Barrales, New York University

Papers

• Giving WOC Their Flowers Through Collage: Archiving the Embodied and Ephemeral Through Arts-based Methods - Wendy Barrales, New York University

• “It’s Hard to See Yourself as a Historical Subject”: Collaging and Queer Archiving - Ali R. Blake, School of the Art Institute of Chicago

• Crafting Counter-Archives of Hidden Civic Histories: Examples from an Asian American Youth-Centric Virtual Inquiry Community - Ankhi Guha Thakurta, Boston College

• Blurred Borders: Creating a Partially Private Digital Archive with Public Visual Representation - Allison Cabana, Graduate Center - CUNY