[Proposal to the Media Art Histories Conference 2013 in Riga, Latvia :: (section: Archiving, preserving and representing new media art) :: fast-forward, couldn’t make it to the conference in Riga, so had to wait to deliver the paper at Balance/UnBalance in 2015…]
Ordered systems require a more-or-less continuous influx of energy to maintain that order. This is the crucial issue embedded at the root of archive. Where does that energy come from and what is the cost? My paper is a brief reflection on this fundamental thermodynamic condition that applies to any ordered system. The archive is one such system. As there are no violations of the Laws of Thermodynamics in the observed universe, is the fate of the archive the same as the heat-death of the cosmos? Invoking an interpretation of living (general) systems theory, it is possible to demarcate the trajectory of the archive (as externally configured (social) memory); to calculate in the widest sense the cost of information storage and reproduction; and to predict the path that individual and collective knowledge takes into the future. In a space of energy flows, it is a relatively simple matter to understand the requirements for the propagation of information. Examining several scalar examples, I will explore the problematic costs of preserving the energized configurations of the past.
John Hopkins holds a transdisciplinary creative practices PhD from La Trobe University/University of Technology Sydney, an MFA from the University of Colorado Boulder, and a BSc in Geophysical Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines. His work and writings explore the role of energy in techno-social systems and explore the effects of technology on energized human encounter. He has taught in more than 20 countries and 60 higher education situations. He is currently teaching on the “Meaning of Information Technology” in the Technology, Arts, and Media program at the University of Colorado Boulder. You may track his process at https://neoscenes.net/blog/. His current CV is located at https://www.neoscenes.net/info/cv/index.php.