Museum, archives and colonial History

Abstract

THE ARCHIVE OF UNNAMED WORKERS: FILLING IN THE GAPS IN PHOTOGRAPHIC ARCHIVES AND AI’S COLONIAL LEGACY

Theopisti Stylianou-Lambert & Alexia Achilleos, Cyprus University of Technology/ CYENS Centre of Excellence

This presentation explores how art practice that uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) attempts to fill in representational gaps and function as a form of archival activism. The first section of the presentation provides the context of our investigation by looking into photographic archives in museums with an emphasis on archaeological-related photographic archives during the colonial period in Cyprus (1878-1960). When taken together, these archives present a fragmented and incomplete history of Cypriot archaeology, especially when appearing online. The second section investigates how AI-generated images are using existing datasets to produce new visual representations; databases which by nature reproduce power imbalances inherited from colonial-era photography. The third section presents and discusses an artwork titled “The Archive of Unnamed Workers” (2022) as an example of how artistic practices may use AI to reveal the inherent power imbalances found in historic archives, fill in visual gaps, and point towards an urgency to decolonize Cypriot archaeology.