Collective Care: The presence of care in archives

During the COVID pandemic, Leah Gouget-Levy was working as the Archives and Curatorial Assistant at London College of Fashion where she was tasked with creating an inventory of all the records and bringing them together at one place. But she wasn’t able to interact with archives due to the restrictions during the pandemic and instead had to work around it by reading records about them. That is what led to the conception of this project.

“It led me to think about how archival records impact the way we approach, imagine and interact with archival objects,” Leah explained.

Leah started working on this project with Ben Whyman from Centre for Fashion Curation and then Amy Goodwin was brought on board. Amy Goodwin is a traditional signwriter who has been working for more than 13 years with travelling fairground and circus, and heritage, reservation industries among others. In traditional signwriting everything is done by hand from design to production of the signs.

Susan Zheng was commissioned to create two patterns working from archival descriptions and Amy deconstructed these to form fragments. These fragments, paired with the numerous discussions she had with Leah and Ben have formed the concept for the signs exhibited.

“How can we care for these objects, not just in terms of being part of the archive, but how can we engage care as an ongoing process by interacting with these records and with these objects in new ways,” Leah elaborated on the intention of the project.

The project is not only extending care to the archives but also showcasing the care of the people who wrote the records and extending care to them by collaborating with them and their writing. Amy’s signs and Leah’s audio piece together tell a story of these archives and those who recorded them. Amy was surprised by how when they were working with the archives they were able to hear their voices and feel the care in their language and she has tried to convey that through the signs.

"In the process of making the signs, it was quite important to get that balance right so that the lettering is accessible and legible, but still demanded the audience actively participate to gain a full understanding.”