LANDSCAPE AS ARCHIVE

Every landscape is a construction. It is the result of a negotiation with nature. Within this process, landscape holds layers of the history that precedes it and builds an 'archaeological archive' that often does not correspond to the official narratives from which we create our realities.

Photography has the power to return its agency to landscape, turning it into a live archive from which different discourses can be generated. Landscape thus becomes a ‘storyteller’ capable of exposing its own history, and with it the history of those who were silenced in the past. The photographic fabrication can help us visualise the layers within landscape, unveiling the consequences of our action over nature, such as the controversies of climate change, or even  traumatic events that occurred in different epochs.

In this session, photographer and scholar Dr. Paul Lowe and invited artist Aletheia Casey will discuss the idea of "Landscape as Archive" through their own artistic practice and visual investigations, exploring landscape as a resource of knowledge and information.

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This event is part of Archivo Sessions | Speakers Series, organised by Archivo Platform in the context of the current volume of Archivo Papers Journal — "Mythologies of the 21st Century", edited by Ana Catarina Pinho and invited editor Andrés Pachón. This Speakers Series is developed in partnership and with the support of PARC - Photography and the Archive Research Centre, at the University of the Arts London (UAL), in the United Kingdom.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

ALETHEIA CASEY

Aletheia Casey is an Australian photographic artist based between Sydney and London. Using historical findings as a background to her stories, Aletheia’s work largely addresses the connection between landscape and identity, and untold histories. She currently lectures at The Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, and The London college of Communication. Aletheia has exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery, Museum Bélvédère (Holland), Photofusion (London), The Perth Centre for Photography (Australia), The Royal Shakespeare Company (London), The National Geographic Society (London), The Australian Centre for Photography and The Art Gallery of Ballarat (Australia), among others.

PAUL LOWE

Member of Archivo Research Network 2021

Reader in Documentary Photography at the University of the Arts London and an award-winning photographer and educator living and working between Sarajevo and London. His work is represented by VII Photo. He has covered breaking news the world over, including the fall of the Berlin Wall, Nelson Mandela’s release, the conflict in the former Yugoslavia and the destruction of Grozny. Recent books include Photography Rulesand A Chronology of Photography.