Collective memory and potential of monuments

The panel at a Frieze Talk, Mark Godfrey (Curator, Tate Modern) Edit András (Art historian and critic) Marko Luliç (Artist) Chair: Simon Rees (Curator, Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius), addressed "the legacies and potential of monuments and public sculptures... and collective memory with which these objects interact" (Frieze Foundation, 2009).

Frieze Foundation (2009) CAC Vilnius presents: Memories, Monoliths, Monsters? [Online]
 http://www.friezefoundation.org/talks/detail/cac_vilnius_presents_memories_monoliths_monsters/ [13/04/2012]

Accuracy of collective/collaborative memories

"Memories are always being negotiated, fought over and shaped by the memories of others." (Fernyhough, 2012)

We sometimes "wrongly incorporate information that has been provided by other people into our own memories," notes Fernyhough (2012). This is also known as "social contagion" caused by the "pressure to fall in line with the memories of family, friends and colleagues" which we often resist, but we occasionally fully believe in "other people's mistaken recollections of the past" (Fernyhough, 2012). In a study conducted at the universities of Hull and Windsor showed that "non-believed memories" (beliefs we no longer think are true but keep experiencing as memories) are reported by more than 20% of adults, showing that we constantly edit our memories, rely on others while "sometimes rejecting their veracity altogether".  Memories are shaped and reconstructed by the self who is doing the remembering, and the stories change when the person's beliefs and emotions change (Fernyhough, 2012).

"Collective memory has an extraordinary power, and it stems from the collaborative, reconstructive nature of memory itself." (Fernyhough, 2012)

We are engaging in "collective remembering" when we mark Remembrance days or anniversaries and there are other less formal ways of "publicly remembering the past". Social remembering, or "memory collaborations" can "diminish the accuracy of our memories, and groups of people sometimes remember things less effectively" than the individuals' remembering. How communal memories and its relation to personal memories or how collaboration helps and hinders memory" are still unresolved.

Fernyhough, Charles (2012) Shared memories and the problems they cause. [Online]

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/jan/14/shared-memories-problems-they-cause [15/01/2012]

Collective and public memories

"Memory has always been a social activity... and our appetite for collective nostalgia is undiminished." (Bell, 2012)

Memory has long been stored "outside of our own individual bodies" and has been social, claims Bell (2012). The changes we are seeing today shifts where the information is stored, from a note on a shelf or a camera to "behind small screens". Bell argues that "our appetite for collective nostalgia" has always been aided by social events, memorial days and monuments such as statues and plaques. The web has become an accessible and very public "repository for our lives: a place to store memories, to be reminded, and to find other people's memories too".

Collective memory can connect and reconnect "us to things we need or want and would otherwise be without," Bell claims, and further argues that we might become more open and honest about our personal and complex histories as we get used to digitised memories.

"After all, memories aren't just about recalling singular facts, but making connections within a complex network. Why not use technology to help extend and enrich this network?" (Bell, 2012)

Bell, Alice (2012) Memory in the Digital Age. [Online]
 http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/jan/14/memories-in-the-digital-age [14/01/2012]