Collection

Interference Archive grew out of the personal collections of two politically active cultural producers, and has since expanded to include tens of thousands of items created as part of social movements around the world, by the participants themselves. Our collection is shaped by people who have historic material that they believe will add to narratives that exist in our archive, or that can fill gaps created by material we don’t have. For us, making this material accessible to the public is an act of preservation, not only of the physical materials, but of the collective history of those struggling for social change.

The material we collect and preserve represents the history and cultural production of social movements–everything from posters and prints, buttons, t-shirts, periodicals, pamphlets, zines, books, moving images, audio recordings, and other ephemera.

We believe that these materials should be held in common: they belong to all those who played a part in their creation. For Interference Archive, making this material accessible to the public is an act of preservation, not only of the physical materials, but of the collective history and memory of those struggling for social change.

Visitors are free to explore our collection. We are an “open stacks” archive. Open stacks means that you can go to the shelves to access things on your own, without putting in a request to see materials.

Material in our collection is organized by format; within each format, material is organized either by subject, or alphabetically by title. Labels on boxes and shelves to help figure out what’s there, and a volunteer staffer is always available to provide some guidance for your search. We hope you enjoy browsing, and discovering things you didn’t even know to look for!

We ask that visitors be gentle with our collection: wash hands first, and then take one box off the shelf at a time and put it back where it came from. Volunteers are available to help with heavy boxes. When handling material, make sure large objects (newspapers and posters) have space to lie flat as you look at them.

Visitors are welcome to take photos. If any other people are going to be in your photos, please check that they are alright with being photographed.

Our online catalog includes a very small amount of our collection. You can search that at catalog.interferencearchive.org

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