“The desert is coming!”: tracing transitions through a personal archive

Abstract

With the Sahara Desert expansion, climate changes and aridity have intensified yearly in Portugal. In 1975, landscape architect Gonçalo Ribeiro Telles warned about this reality, stating “Man precedes the desert; the desert succeeds him” (quoted by heart), urging comprehension of the landscape’s social and biophysical structure limits, which hinge on the perception of each reality or ecological capacity; otherwise, the desert overcomes. This article delves into the archival experience of Gonçalo Ribeiro Telles’ work, exploring desert and landscape as the paradoxes of the hidden memory of a personal archive that is not accessible or the reflection of the creator that emerges from the archival process. Three topics are discussed: Void as a place of memory. Deserts, like archives, embody a sense of material continuity while, at the same time, they evoke an unsettling emptiness. Our standpoint transforms their essence, giving access to other times and memories only through traces and their reconstitution. Embark on a journey. While archives are plentiful with research material, the journey to navigate and uncover the meaningful connections within can resemble an expedition into the vastness of a desert where access to information occurs at each activation, influenced by social or personal factors and concerns. Nothingness becomes fullness when in context. Archives and landscapes are an expression of relationship networks, and our future is built upon the recognition of this network, the processes to access memory, but also rely on affectivity and the care we pay to them.