Art History Archive

The Art History Archive explores the institutional history, obsolescence, and technological and cultural significance of the slide medium. Recognized for their brilliant color reproduction and inventive presentation format, photographic slides were fetishized by artists and educators, and widely used by amateur photographers since the 1940s. Along with digitization came obsolescence and disappearance of slides. In recent years I inherited slide archives discarded from a number of art history departments across the country. Inevitable digitization processes have affected the archives along the way changing the ways we study art history. Surrounded by vast amounts of slides in studio provokes both admiration and panic. What to do with the precious objects, and their representations and histories? How to prevent their oblivion, and salvage the images?