The Secret Life of Objects: Archiving and Storytelling through Everyday Things

About

This course explores how ordinary and overlooked objects can be archived and activated into powerful carriers for memory, identity and used as tools for storytelling and interaction. Students will first be introduced to theories and practices around objects, collections, and archives, engaging readings like Dawn Raffel’s The Secret Life of Objects, Yanagi Sōetsu’s The Beauty of Everyday Things, and Craig Staff’s The Materiality of the Archive. We will discuss how artists, museums, and archives work with material culture to provoke questions, preserve memory, and spark audience participation.

There will also be visits to archival and museum collections in Weimar (such as the Archiv der Moderne and Bauhaus-Universität Weimar Bibliothek) to conduct hands-on research. Each student will then select an object, ordinary or overlooked, and develop a creative archival project. These may take the form of interactive installations, conceptual collections, performative storytelling, or digital narratives.

The second week will conclude with a group-built “alternative museum,” where participants present their projects for the Bauhaus Summer School Open Studios. Together, we will reveal the surprising, layered lives of the objects around us.

Key Readings:

Sue Breakell and Wendy Russell – The Materiality of the Archive: Creative Practice in Context (2024)
András Szántó (ed.) – The Future of the Museum: 28 Dialogues (2020)
Yanagi Sōetsu – The Beauty of Everyday Things (2019 translation by Brase, M.)
Dawn Raffel – The Secret Life of Objects (2012)
Don Norman - The Design of Everyday Things (2013 ed)

Course leader

Sophie Foster

Target group

Undergraduate and graduate students and professionals, with a general interest in intercultural context, and socially engaged artistic practices

Course aim

By the end of the course, students will be able to:

- Critically examine how objects and collections communicate cultural and historical narratives.
- Develop creative strategies to “activate” ordinary objects through storytelling and interaction.
- Conduct practical archival and object-based research in online and on-site collections.
- Collaborate to curate and present their work to a public audience

Fee info