The Archiv of public protests
The Archive collects images and visual traces of social activism that constitute not just ideals against political decisions but also a warning against rising popularism and discrimination.
It concerns xenophobia, homophobia, misogyny and climate crisis.
Tha main purpose of the creators is to prolung the life of their images that ends with their publication in the press.
First of all the APP gathers togheter photographs in a easily accessible collection for artists and activists.
In second hand the Archive and its images will be open to all users who reflect themselves to creators’ values.
It is important to mention the archiving of public gatherings proposed by Rafael Drozdowski to study events happening for serveral years now on the Polish street. It seems unambitious but it is extremely responsible since it builds an influence of the way of thinking about protests and the need of studying the visuality of protests, their aesthetics, performance and setting.
These are the prerequisites of the creators of the Archive of Public Protests, whose first publication you are holding.
Despite the traditional terminology adopted in the name of this photographic venture, the archive is characterised by a loose organizational structure and distances itself from the aesthetic canons of photojournalism.
It is a natural evolution of a journalistic primer that priorities engagement and commitment in times full of injustices against the weakest.We are still talking about an institutional invention but its contents can become a banner inyour hand, a poster on a building, a picture on a wall, they can become a part of a bodily gesture,an agent of transformation and political change, instead of merely representing resistance.
Listen to the words of the artist Rafal Milach