Course Description: Prof. Arnold Dreyblatt

The City as Archive: Urban Collective Memory and mediale Intervention
How can artists respond to the often violent forces of destruction and reconstruction of the urban context caused by massive Industrial development, war, urban planning and commercial interests? What sort of dialog can artists initiate in communication with local inhabitants, if at all? We will take a critical look at the histories of artistic intervention in utopian, urban and social realities from the early Soviet era to 'Public Art' as we develop project proposals.
Student projects shall begin with historical research, collection and documention in 'mapping' the collective memory 'loci' of the 'cityscape'. Inner and outer urban spaces are brought to serve as temporary reflective sites for local inhabitants and visitors through mediale intervention by installation, performance and exhibition.
Sound Workshop in Bauwollespinnerei St. Ingbert

Students plan and realize installations with 'long strings' and other sound producing objects in the large hall of the former 'Bauwollespinnerei' in St. Ingbert and develop performance strategies which consider the acoustic properties of resonant spaces.

This project seminar was coordinated within the framework of other initiatives from the HbK Saar which focused on the decaying city-center of Völklingen.

Class and Seminar Descriptions: Prof. Arnold Dreyblatt

Archiv und Denkmal (Archive and Monument)
How can we create an artistic environment for visualizing and memorializing the artificial memory traces in our contemporary lives? What are the processes of selection, storage and interaction that determine which fragments of texts and artifacts will remain and which will be lost to us? Which role do memorials and archives play in official representations of the past? Student projects involve the research, collection and treatment of original archival materials. The resulting group and individual works will reflect diverse forms of presentation which intersect the boudaries of installation and performance with traditional and digital media. Specific city-spaces and landscapes sites will be chosen for project presentations.

Exhibition by Students:
Archiv, Denkmal, Museum (Archive, Monumnet, Museum)
Four artworks as a response to a discussion on the the mechanism of collection in the archive and museum and the processes by which we chose to represent the past.
Individual projects confronted the preservation of local memory in the urban landscape and in language; the naming, categorization and personallization of artifacts, and the imprint of unwanted traces on personal effects.
A fifth work, presented in the form of a documented action, examined prevelant themes of observation , security, and the storage of personal data.

Inventar (Inventory),2002
Web: http://www.dreyblatt.de/Inventar/Index.html

"Inventar" was a project of students of Prof. Arnold Dreyblatt at the HbK Saar in Saarbrücken. Students who have participated in Dreyblatt's Seminar, "Archiv, Denkmal, Museum" have chosen an abandoned house in the village of Rubenheim, Saarland for an intensive research project which will resulted in a site-specific presentation.
The house complex in Rubenheim has been inhabited for generations by the same family and contains a millenry shop and tailor workshop. The last member of this family vacated the premises only recently because of illness, so that artistic intervention takes place within a temporary state in which traces of the past are still to be found. It is expected that the house will be sold in the near future, after which the architectronic context and interior contents will be forever lost.

Students spent five days in the house examining the material traces of the past which remain. At the end of the research period, students created an exhibition in various media which will be installed in the (Millenry) shop and throughout the house. Visitors from the Art Academy, residents of Saarland and especially the inhabitants of Rubenheim were invited to an open house/exhibition.