Walls as documents for remembering in the face of censorship. Case study: The Des/Aparicions project by Antoni Muntadas

Reflecting on memory is a topic that occupies a pivotal place in contemporary art. In itself, this reflects the human need to preserve the history in its entirety, from retrieving Historical Memory with the aid of memory laws as a form of justice for the victims of wars and conflicts, right through to rescuing personal and individual recollections that combine to form the collective memory of different identity groups. The artist takes on the role of historian and examines a range of verbal and written sources. On occasions, such as in the case we are focusing on here, he creates archives in which the censorship to which historiography is subject becomes apparent. He also analysis ruins and traces as a living document, a reflection of the events that have occurred in particular places.

This article analyses the case study of the project Des/Aparicions (Dis/Appearances), created by Antoni Muntadas in 1996 in the Arts Santa Mònica cultural centre, based on the statements and reflections taken from a conversation we held with the artist, which is reproduced in this text. The use digital media and the Internet, taking advantage of the historical context of the building, leads to a hybrid and symbiotic site-specific counter-monument in which the walls become the medium for disappeared memories that are presented in a fragmentary and volatile way in a space for reflection located halfway between metaphor and literality.