Archive Fever II

Just received some photos of the Archive Fever II conference I took part in last month at Goldsmiths, so i thought I'd post a couple. In one I look like I've turned into a preacher man..not sure what happened there. Thanks to David for the photos.

The theme of the conference was "Building a Virtual Archive: Collections in the making." My presentation focused on searching electronic archives, such as youtube and the art of crate diggin' (searching out and collecting obscure records). I consider there to be many similarities between the museum archivist and the crate digger. And I'm particulary interested in the phenomenum of collectors posting their record collections onto youtube, and the issues that brings up in turns of copyright vs the desire to share this music within the public domain. Here's a great short film on crate diggin', parts of which I sampled live during the performance. Free Samples

The evening before the event, I was running through the presentation, which was a standard powerpoint job and I thought there's something not right here, and it's a bit dull. Then I realised that I wasn't being true to the project's ethos of sampling, trialing and mixing things up. So I decided at the very very very last minute to give a kind of improvised performance - searching, mixing and scratching clips from youtube, one turntable and various vinyl from my collection, my AKAI MPC, and video and audio recordings from the Sampler-Culture Clash workshops we've run.

It was the first time I'd tried anything like that before, and in a more formal seminar type environment. Normally the room is dark, I'm drunk, and well the audience is drunk too!! Needless to say it was hmm..chaotic, particularly when my computer crashed half way through. As one audience member put it "yours was the distinctive presentation", which I took as a compliment. It seemed to go down well though, and was definitely more interesting for me in terms of presenting an idea in a lecture theatre setting. Something to think about and build on. If you were there it would be good to get your feedback.

I'll post a video of my presentation when I get a copy of the film. Oh and I really enjoyed the conference, with some really interesting and diverse speakers. I recommend you check the Constance Howard link on the right of my blog page to find out more.