“Act of archiving is an attempt to resist transformation or in other words to strengthen the memory of a specific state of being.”

- An unknown source, early 19th century, (from the Letters of the Shiibeediiom).

He entered the room. The floor was wooden and loud, making high-pitched screechy sounds under his feet. The room was a Biodiversity Section of the Historical Museum of the Shiibeediioom. He could feel the odorant molecules of pastness, the smell of archival chemicals and dust in the air. The room was full of arid, preserved plants and taxidermied creatures of the past. 

These flora and fauna, which seemed drying and decomposing in front of his eyes in a hanging manner, were definitely here, in front of him, in this particular room. They were being held by steel, the steel by screws. The artifacts of the exposition were part of the space, that specific constellation of walls, floor, and ceiling, which mapped the borders of that room in his mind.

The presence of these artifacts in this particular space also creates an absence in their original areas of existence, where they were grown and taken from. This absence is also a kind of existence, he thought. But the empty spaces they left behind in the soil were probably now being overtaken by the over-growth of weeds, by new flora, new molecules. Therefore, their absence, their only remaining trace of existence in the area of their origin, was also ceasing to exist.

The archive of absence. The floor was made from wood, and as he walked, he could hear it under the rubber soles of his shoes. 

Text by the Artist.