Archive Quotes

“People like to be shown around archives. I don’t know why. I’m in the business, but one row of shelves stuffed with manila files looks much like another.”
― V.T. Davy, Black Art

“Everyone today has a story; the world’s an archive.”
― Anne Rice, The Wolf Gift

“Research material can turn up anywhere - in a dusty old letter in an archive, a journal or some old photographs you find in a charity shop.”
― Sara Sheridan

“It's cold in the archives, and there's nobody there. I belong in the archives. I am cold too.”
― Isaac Fellman, Dead Collections

“(...) compor meticulosamente o cadastro afetivo e o retrato fantástico-histórico de uma comunidade e de uma de suas remotas jornadas de meio século atras. E isso não com os instrumentos racionais, a ficha, o documento, o testemunho, caros ao arqueólogo do cotidiano, mas por meio de um sortilégio espontâneo de silhuetas que se esvaziaram gradativamente, uma depois da outra, numa parede: relicário de epifanias momentâneas, cinema de larvas dispersas; o insuficiente butim de um aprendiz de Noé que, depois do diluvio, para não esquecer o mundo, andasse a vasculhar os fosseis soterrados na areia (...)”
― Gesualdo Bufalino, Museo d'ombre

“We may observe in some of the abrupt grounds we meet with, sections of great masses of strata, where it is as easy to read the history of the sea, as it is to read the history of Man in the archives of any nation.”
― J. A. de (Jean André) Luc

“Since the first satellites had been orbited, almost fifty years earlier, trillions and quadrillions of pulses of information had been pouring down from space, to be stored against the day when they might contribute to the advance of knowledge. Only a minute fraction of all this raw material would ever be processed; but there was no way of telling what observation some scientist might wish to consult, ten, or fifty, or a hundred years from now. So everything had to be kept on file, stacked in endless airconditioned galleries, triplicated at the [data] centers against the possibility of accidental loss. It was part of the real treasure of mankind, more valuable than all the gold locked uselessly away in bank vaults.”
― Arthur C. Clarke

“A shadow archive and an archive of shadows, the literary architectonic demands a resistance to excessive illumination.”
― Akira Mizuta Lippit, Atomic Light

“Victoria Lane: What hints or tips would you give for other artists who are starting a negotiation with an institution for their archive?

Barbara Stevini: I would tell them they need to work out what would they like their archive to do and for whom. It's actually the same questions I would ask when going into any institution or doing a placement - what is the context? What is the motivation I have for a placement there? What is the motivation of that hosting organisation to receive it? Is there any fusion of appropriately motivated endeavor from which something can happen from the placement of an archive here, for both parties concerned? I think those questions to be asked about doing anything at all, otherwise you're contaminating the planet aren't you?”
― Victoria Lane, All this Stuff: Archiving the Artist

“The difference between an achiever and a loser is,
An achiever never gives up, never settles and lastly never forgets.”
― Akash Lakhotia, World Hypnotized: Making of the Fuhrer

“Why are you so scared and creeping around,
taking photographs all over town,
pictures in the dark that live in the light,
the world is my playground too and I’ll do what I like.”
― Archive

“There are times when one is with their camera that beautiful and magical things will come into view. Do not let them slip by for they must be shared with the now and tomorrow.”
― Christopher Paul Flateau

“Archive as if the future depends on it.”
― Lisbet Tellefsen, archivist

“Most of the politicians don't really understand that politics is not a marathon, but more like a hurdle relay race were the baton needs to be passed in order to achieve the win for the team.”
― Radovan Kavický