DECENTERING THE ARCHIVE:

Decentering the Archive: Visual Fabrications of Sonic Memories navigates various strategies of inverting and subverting the ordered, categorised and confined cultural archive, in this case, the Documentation Centre for Music (DOMUS) at the University of Stellenbosch. This practice-based doctoral study treats DOMUS as the site for a creative production of decentered reading and writing from archival fragments, while interrogating the role and power of the archive in manipulating time and collective memories by asking the question: How should fragmented or destabilising experiences be remembered given the delinking option from both modernity and post-modernity?

My referral to Decolonial theory at the start of this study prompted me to test new possibilities through the “decolonial options” that Walter Mignolo describes as operating “from the margins and beyond the margins of the modern/colonial order. It posits alternatives in relation to the control of the economy (market value), the control of the state (politics of heritage based on economic wealth), and the control of knowledge” (Mignolo & Vázquez, 2013). Since my heritage lies on the side of the coloniser while I grew up within the context of a colonised nation, my position as a South African citizen is divided and complex, hence my attraction to the margins.

As an artist who cuts up and rearranges image, text, and sound, my study of an archive can never be strictly scholarly, as in, disciplined and inhibited. Hence, I determined a decolonial option of working with the archive: to re-invest it with an ability to bleed – to traverse the rigid taxonomies and artificial fictional separations between categories that are generally foundational to the archival process of storing (and building on) records of social, cultural and political practices. Sound in the archive, however, carries traces of pulse in rhythm, breath and voice – traces of blood beating – and brings to awareness the vibrations of one’s own tympanic membrane. It is the fabric of sound, the pulse of a particular history through sound that stimulates the composition of memories. “Through the ear, we shall enter the invisibility of things” (Edmond Jabès, 1984).

The work which is embedded in herri is divided into four passages, these are Surfaces, Invagination, Noise and The Mask. These passages are further infused by my conceptual framing through the terms dehiscence and pentimento, borrowed from the fields of medicine and painting, indicating the leap across mediums, disciplines and territories of knowledge towards a multidimensional understanding of time and space through and beyond the senses.

Decentering the Archive: Visual Fabrications of Sonic Memories volg verskeie strategieë van omkering en ondermyning van orde, kategorie en die ingeperkte argief, in hierdie geval die Dokumentasiesentrum vir Musiek (DOMUS) aan Stellenbosch Universiteit. Hierdie geïntegreerde doktorale studie gebruik DOMUS as ‘n terrein vir die kreatiewe skep van gedesentraliseerde lesings en skrywes in argivale fragmente.

Die studie neem die rol en mag van die argief in die manipulasie van tyd en kollektiewe herinneringe onder oorweging, en vra: Hoe word gedestabiliseerde en gefragmenteerde ervarings onthou in die lig van die uitoefening van die opsie om te ontkoppel aan moderniteit en post-moderniteit? Dekoloniale teorie, met verwysing na die “dekoloniale opsies” wat Walter Mignolo beskryf as synde aktief “in die kantlyne en duskant die kantlyne van die moderne/koloniale orde”, was ‘n vertrekpunt om nuwe moontlikhede te toets in hierdie verband; opsies wat alternatiewe postuleer “in verhouding tot die beheer oor die ekonomie (markwaarde) die beheer oor die staat (die politiek van erfenis gebaseer op ekonomiese welvaart), en die beheer oor kennis” (Mignolo & Vázquez, intyds: 2013).

Aangesien ek grootgeword het in die konteks van ‘n gekoloniseerde land, is my erfenis ‘n koloniale een, en is my posisie as Suid-Afrikaanse burger gesplete en kompleks. Daarom fokus ek op dít wat marginaal is. As ‘n kunstenaar wat werk met beeld, teks, klank, uitvoering, hauntologie en remix, kan my bemoeienis met die argief nooit net streng vakkundig en akademies wees nie. Een moontlik dekoloniale opsie om met die argief te werk, sou kon wees om dit te her-investeer met die moontlikheid om te bloei – om die rigiede taksonomieë en kunsmatige fiktiewe verwyderings tussen kategorieë wat oor die algemeen funderend is tot die argivale prosesse van die berging (en uitbouiing) van rekords van sosiale, kulturele en politieke praktyke, oor te steek. Klank in die argief dra die polsing van ritme, asem en stem – eggo’s van pompende bloed – en skep ‘n bewussein van die vibrasies van die eie tempaniese membraan. Dit is die tekstuur van klank, die polsing van ‘n partikuliere geskiedenis deur klank, wat die komposisie van herinneringe stimuleer. “Deur die oor sal ons die onsigbaarheid van dinge binnegaan” (Edmond Jabès, 1984).

Die studie is verdeel in vier gange: Oppervlaktes, Invaginering, Geraas en Die Masker. Hierdie gange word verder belig deur konseptuele rame aan die orde gestel deur die terme “dehiscence” and “pentimento”, ontleen aan die studievelde van die geneeskunde en die skilderkuns. Hiermee poog ek ‘n sprong tussen media, dissiplines, en territoriums van kennis om te reik na ‘n multidimensionele verstaan van tyd en ruimte, deur en buite die sintuiglike. Dit alles word gekalibreer en gefokus deur die lens van die domestieke.

To all those whom I benefited from throughout this treacherous journey – in supervision, archival assistance, advice, wisdom, talent, constructive criticism, interest, encouragement, concern, recognition, understanding, empathy and faith, as well as emotional, psychological and financial support – I thank you dearly and deeply from the bottom of my humble heart, you know who you are and I could never have reached the end of this line without each and every one of you.

I dedicate this study to my dearest Aryan and Abraxas Kaganof – thank you for your love and patience.