A future museum of the present

Following an invitation from the Centre of Contemporary Art (CBK) Dordrecht, Piper was invited to undertake a two month Residency researching historical and contemporary material held in the ‘DiEP’ Archive, Dordrecht. In line with his ongoing body of research around the official formation of archival memory, Piper undertook to spend the period of the residency interacting with local residents and artists towards the formation of a ‘museum’ of the present.
Transforming a local shop-fronted building adjacent to the CBK into ‘A Future Museum of the Present’, Piper explored ideas derived from Bourriaud’s notion of ‘Relational Aesthetics’ to devise a series of socially engaged ‘micro projects’. Each of these projects was designed to engage with and scrutinize contemporary notions of ‘Dutchness’ as viewed from the perspective of the non-Dutch outsider, in a subversive twist on the role of the historical anthropological archivist. These acts of ‘tricksterism’ (the playful subversion of dominant power relationships) were framed in full collaboration with local residents and members of the Dordrecht arts community, who actively contributed to a growing ‘museum’ of ephemeral objects featuring the Dutch national colour ‘orange’, and in many cases agreed to having their portraits taken juxtaposed with chosen objects from the collection.
At the end of the project, the entire Museum will be acquired by the City Archive Dordrecht ‘DiEP’, for its contribution to the documentation of local histories.

The ‘Museum’ opened to the Public in September of 2010 in connection with a group exhibition entitled ‘UnFixed’ at the CBK, in which Piper also had work. Within the ‘museum’, the outcomes of the various micro-projects were organized within a user interactive projected display, alongside physical objects and photographs. A series of six ‘Micro-Publications’ documenting various elements of the project were published digitally. A publication of the ‘UnFixed’ project edited by Sara Blockland and Asmara Pelupessy has been produced with an Artist Statement/Chapter by Piper p60-69 (ISBN 978-94-90322-29-8)