From Archive to Regeneration
In the 21st century, physical entities for the recording of events, memorialization of people, and the technologies for communication have evolved into digital matter defined by ephemeral data streams, invisible informational exchanges, and the capturing of humanity in packaged bytes. The evolution of our social networks and its subsequent impact on interconnecting not only the individual to people but also people to events, reveals that history and memory in a globalized world are dense and collective. These networks have transcended into how we cope with our own mortality through virtualized memorials, digital archives of the deceased, and social networks for the dead.
However, the lack of integration of this cybernated world of the departed into the physicality of death has resulted in mortuary infrastructure and architecture that still reflects customs of permanence and conclusion. In both instances, the notion of archive becomes the defining feature for bodies within the physical space or digitized relics within the virtual memorial. Therefore, can we imagine an alternative architecture that promotes the use of these digital networks as a proponent for transcending the archive and promoting the regeneration of collective memory of those who have passed?
To begin, further emphasis should be placed on aiming to readapt the ways in which we access and memorialize those that have passed. The memorializing of the deceased by the living gives identity and meaning to the life of a person, serving as an extension through memory of the legacy of that individual. Hart Island serves as a point of interest in that it has been structured as a repository for individuals whose legacies were squandered the moment they arrived on the island. Established as NYC’s public cemetery in 1869, Hart Island has been the burial site for over 1 million unclaimed and indigent bodies, making it the largest public cemetery in the world. Under the jurisdiction of the Department of Correction in NYC, the public has historically been restricted from accessing the island and their loved ones discovered to be buried within one of the many mass graves. Therefore, I propose Hart Island to be seen less as a physical site and more as an entity that can utilize different public and social networks to mirror itself within a more accessible virtual environment.
In such a globally connected virtual environment, the claiming of a body on Hart Island will serves as the catalyst for this virtual hub that utilizes the archive as a tool for regenerative properties that effect the immersive qualities of the space. For the claimer, the memorial would transcend from the archive of names and digital artifacts of those buried on the island to a collective regenerative repository of the deceased. These processes of regeneration all culminate towards a search for the uncanny within the way we memorialize and the spaces we allocate as memorials.
Hence, such an architecture proposes a certain temporality and fluidity within the formal and functional qualities of a memorial for the deceased. Uncanniness derived from regeneration of the archive is prioritized over relics from the past as an attempt to allow for claimers to discover new readings and associations related not only to their loved ones, but also to our perception of memory itself.