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Eve Olney

Eve Olney

P: + 353-1-4027191
E: eveol@hotmail.com
Campus: Aungier Street

Research Topic: Cultural Memory and Private/Public Music Archives

The central concern of my practice-based doctoral research is an examination of the cultural significance of the private music collector and the private music archive, through an exploration of the relationship between the collector and collected objects. Photographic and auditory fieldwork is currently being conducted in a private collection of old-time and bluegrass music in Northern Ireland. Ongoing encounters with the collector relays the different practices performed in this archive on a daily basis. This thesis contextualizes these private collecting practices within a broader international collecting community, whilst also attempting to situate the role/cultural position of the private music collector within the well-documented historical institutional practices of collecting and the preservation of this kind of music. Considerations are currently being made as to the future of this private collection beyond the lifespan of the collector. This study problematises the absence of institutional cultural space both in Ireland and the UK for such a private collection, further considering the potential loss of the embodied knowledge of the collector and how this may affect future readings of the collection. The practical elements of the project address how this private archive might potentially enter the public arena through technological preservation. The study will culminate in the production of a multi-media installation, which aims to describe/represent the transition of the private collection into the public realm. The installation will feature soundscapes and projected photographic imagery using media collected during fieldwork s as well as drawing on technologies integral to the collection itself, such as reel-to-reel taped correspondence.

Selected Conferences

2008
‘Soundscapes and Visual Landscapes of the Private Music Archive', AVPhD Regional Workshop, South Wales and South West England, University of Wales, Newport, Wales, UK.

‘Cultural Memory and the Private Music Archive’, GRADCAM Conference, Arts Research: The State of Play. Project Arts Centre, Temple Bar, Dublin.

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