Constant

Mondotheque::a radiated booklaunch

Femke Snelting — 2016-09-01T13:22:05Z

In 1919 the Mundaneum occupied half of the majestic Cinquantenaire building in Brussels. The ambitious project was imagined by Paul Otlet and Henri Lafontaine as a mix between documentation center, conference venue and educational display. "The Mundaneum is an Idea, an Institution, a Method, a Body of workmaterials and collections, a Building, a Network." (Paul Otlet, Monde)

In 2013 a band of artists, archivists and activists set out to unravel the many implications of a statement that routinely compared the Mundaneum to "Google on paper". Under the moniker Mondotheque they organised discussions, reflections and workshops in various locations. A Semantic MediaWiki functioned as a platform for writing, editing and bookdesign. The publication of Mondotheque::a radiating book creates a moment, an incision into this collaborative process. It is an invitation into the entanglements of knowledge infrastructures, geo-politics and local histories.

Welcome!

Saturday 24 September

15:00-17:00 The Itinerant Archive: A walk following the invisible traces of The Mundaneum through Brussels.

Meet us at 15:00 sharp at Place Rogier in front of the main entrance to the Belfius building

17:00-20:00 The radiating booklaunch. Books and drinks at democratic prices al fresco.

Meet us in Leopoldspark behind Brulabo (former Institut d 'Anatomie Raoul Warocqué). Back-up location in case of heavy rain: Chez Bernard, Place Jourdan.

Sunday 25 September

13:00-16:00 Discussion and lunch with Mondotheque with André Castro, Dennis Pohl, Dick Reckard, Natacha Roussel, Femke Snelting, Alexia de Visscher, Shinyoung Yeo, ...

Location: Constant@WTC25, Koning Albert II-laan 28-30 (side-entrance). Important: to enter the building on Sunday you need to confirm your presence by e-mail before Friday 23-09 at donatella@constantvzw.org

With the support of: Vlaamse GemeenschapsCommissie

View online : http://www.mondotheque.be

Workshop: Le livre sur le livre

Donatella — 2015-10-08T16:49:14Z

In 1934, Paul Otlet published the Treaty of documentation - The book on the book, in which he envisaged the organization of the intellectual work of documentation, and the future of books. More than 80 years later, The Treaty has entered into the public domain. Mondothèque invites developers, designers, artists, theorists, writers, archivists and copyleft activists to meet and rethink this important publication.

With: Alexia de Visscher, Femke Snelting, Loraine Furter, Antoine Motte dit Falisse, Michael Murtaugh, Gijs de Heij, An Mertens.

The program is a combination of conferences and workshops (in French).

View online : http://www.mondotheque.be/wiki/inde...

Ideographies of knowledge

Donatella — 2015-10-08T16:11:56Z

"Once one read; today one refers to, checks through, skims." - Paul Otlet, 1903

Mondotheque contributes to Ideographies of knowledge, an event that brings together a number of digital librarians, media theorists, designers, researchers and artists to discuss novel ways of reading and writing research in the digital networked environment. It is to investigate the poetics, aesthetics and politics of information and knowledge in relation to digital libraries, search engines and the legacy of library/documentation science. It is to bring attention to the individual practises of resituating and repurposing knowledge today.

The symposium is organised in the framework of Dušan Barok's residency at Cafe Europa - Mons2015: http://mons2015.eu

With: Dušan Barok (Bergen), Matthew Fuller (London), Geraldine Juárez (Gothenburg), Stéphanie Manfroid (Mons), Marcell Mars (Lüneburg), Nikita Mazurov (Malmö¶), Tomislav Medak (Zagreb), Michael Murtaugh (Brussels), Robert M Ochshorn (San Francisco), Barbora Å edivá (Brno), Femke Snelting (Brussels), MatÄ›j Strnad (Prague)

View online : http://monoskop.org/Ideographies_of...

Mondothèque at Otlet Salons

denis — 2015-09-21T16:40:11Z

Femke represents Mondothèque at the Mundaneum Edition of the Otlet Salons, a "network event that aims to foster new cooperation across the borders of disciplines, institutions and society." With Pieter Colpaert (Keynote: How data want to be reused), Marc Vael (ISACA, UAMS and Solvay), Jan Van Hee (Arteveldehogeschool, POLITEIA) and Philippe van Impe (European Data Innovation Hub).

- Mondothèque / Presentation, Archives, Discussion

Mondothèque

denis — 2015-06-04T16:20:58Z

Mondotheque is a platform for experiments with the legacy of the universalist and documentalist Paul Otlet such as drawings, images, systems, ideas.

The project is named after La Mondothèque, Otlet's 1934 design for an imaginary device, a research machine that could be at the same time archive, instrument, desk, catalog and broadcasting station.

Mondothèque is inspired by the obstinate spirit of Paul Otlet, and wants to look at the way knowledge is managed and distributed today in a way that allows us to invent other futures and different narrations of the past.

Mondothèque mailinglist: https://listes.domainepublic.net/listinfo/mondotheque

For The Mundaneum archive center in Mons/Bergen, please go here: http://mundaneum.org

View online : http://www.mondotheque.be/

Mondotheque: Manual for a Diffraction Machine

denis — 2015-06-04T16:09:02Z

(Presentation in the context of the Public Library Festival)

"Humanity is at a turning point in its history. The mass of available information is formidable. New instruments are necessary for simplifying and condensing it, or the intellect will never know how to overcome the difficulties which overwhelm it, nor realise the progress that it glimpses and to which it aspires".
(Paul Otlet, Traité de documentation, 1934)

In 1993, the remains of Otlet's extensive collection of documents were moved from Brussels to The Mundaneum Archive Center in Mons. Located in a former mining region in the south of Belgium, Mons is also right next to Google's largest datacenter in Europe. Due to the re-branding of Otlet as a 'founding father of the Internet', and 'visionary inventor of Google on paper', his oeuvre received international attention. Simultaneously, local politicians are ceasing the moment, making The Mundaneum a central node in their rhetorical promise of turning the industrial heartland into a home for The Internet Age. Google — grateful for discovering their posthumous francophone roots — signed a collaboration contract with The Mundaneum in 2013. The archive center outsourced its digital archives to the search giant, allowing them to publish hundreds of documents on the website of The Google Cultural Institute.

Bringing these ever expanding entanglements gradually to light, a band of artists, archivists and activists formed. Wanting to make a difference from how geographically situated histories are meshed into generic slogans, concerned by faltering local governments pushing cultural infrastructures into the hands of global corporations and perplexed by the apparently still undigested dreams of universal knowledge, we decided to appropriate Mondothèque as a frame of reference. Imagined by Paul Otlet in 1934, La Mondothèque was to be a 'thinking machine': archive, link generator, desk, catalog and broadcast station at the same time. The dreamed capacity of Mondothèque to combine scales, perspectives and media started to function as a diffraction device, as a platform to envision our modest but persistent interventions together.

View online : https://www.memoryoftheworld.org/bl...

We don't live in this kind of world

Femke Snelting — 2014-09-24T21:40:45Z

For the seminar Public Library. über Infrastrukturen der Wissensbildung (Public Library. About infrastructures of knowledge formation), Femke prepares a new episode of Fathers of the Internet, charting the overtures between an Internet giant, local governments and a historical archive.

"In 1944, Belgium universalist and documentalist Paul Otlet died a disillusioned man. In his lifetime he only partially realised The Mundaneum, an encyclopedic survey of human knowledge which would 'progressively constitute a permanent and complete representation of the entire world'. While Otlet is being rediscovered as "a founding father of the Internet", Google adopted the remains of his archive in Mons. Located in a former mining area in the south of Belgium, Mons is not only home town to prime minister Elio Di Rupo, but also conveniently located next to one of Google's largest datacenters in Europe. This lecture explores the messy entanglements of faltering local governments, dreams of accessible knowledge, and the hopeful desire for corporate patronage."

View online : http://www.wkv-stuttgart.de/program...

Fathers of the Internet

Femke Snelting — 2014-04-29T23:57:52Z

In 2013, Belgium universalist, pacifist and feminist Paul Otlet was recognized as 'a founding father of the Internet'. Simultaneously, Google adopted the remains of Otlet's archive at the Mundaneum in Mons, not only home town of prime minister Elio Di Rupo but also conveniently located next to their large datacenter in St. Ghislain. Since than, the Mundaneum proudly advertises itself as Google on paper and The great ancestor of Google. We think it is time to tell some other stories.

Research presentations and discussion as part of an ongoing exploration of the entanglements of artificial intelligence, patronage and government.

With contributions by a.o Dick Reckard, Natacha Roussel, Marcell Mars and Femke Snelting.