The Blank Spots: Making Migratory Archives Visible by Exploring Photographs

Abstract

Globalized cities, like Basel with its pharmaceutical industry, are shaped by migration. At the same time migration, one of the driving forces of urbanization, scarcely surfaces in public discourse. Due to a dominant codified remembrance politics that unfolds along the lines of national discourse, official archives and museums fail to integrate evidence and objects testifying to migration into their collections. This article presents three case studies of another type of archive—namely the Özlem Fotostudio, The House of Resistance and Solidarity, and Novartis and the Papageienhäuser (Parrot Blocks)—all of which were studied in a research project conducted in Basel in preparation for the exhibition "Çok Basel! Transnational Memoryscapes Switzerland—Turkey,” during May 3–June 30, 2019. This article challenges the common understanding of an archive as a static form of storage. It shows how photographs, as triggers of memory and storytelling, can be interrogated and function as apt tools to make migratory archives, hidden memories, and narratives of migrant communities visible.