“This omissum is an attempt to address a blindspot in Mondotheque::a radiated book, and intends to intervene in the way Paul Otlet has been portrayed in general. Terms like ‘visionary’ or ‘pacifist’ are used, among others, to paint a romantic image of Otlet as a charismatic, heroic figure. An omissum is attached to Mondotheque::a radiated book to signal the fact that the figure as well as his oeuvre are committed to a colonial and racist project.”

Omissum: https://diversions.constantvzw.org/paul-otlet-an-omissum.html

Intervention in Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Paul_Otlet&diff=950711784&oldid=949099522&diffmode=source

“Humanity is at a turning point in its history. The mass of available information is formidable. New instruments are necessary for simplifying and condensing it, or the intellect will never know how to overcome the difficulties which overwhelm it, nor realise the progress that it glimpses and to which it aspires”. (Paul Otlet, Traité de documentation, 1934)

In 1993, the remains of Otlet’s extensive collection of documents were moved from Brussels to The Mundaneum Archive Center in Mons. Located in a former mining region in the south of Belgium, Mons is also right next to Google’s largest datacenter in Europe. Due to the re-branding of Otlet as a ‘founding father of the Internet’, and ‘visionary inventor of Google on paper’, his oeuvre received international attention. Simultaneously, local politicians are ceasing the moment, making The Mundaneum a central node in their rhetorical promise of turning the industrial heartland into a home for The Internet Age. Google — grateful for discovering their posthumous francophone roots — signed a collaboration contract with The Mundaneum in 2013. The archive center outsourced its digital archives to the search giant, allowing them to publish hundreds of documents on the website of The Google Cultural Institute.

Bringing the ever expanding entanglements gradually to light, a band of artists, archivists and activists formed. Wanting to make a difference from how geographically situated histories are meshed into generic slogans, concerned by faltering local governments pushing cultural infrastructures into the hands of global corporations and perplexed by the apparently still undigested dreams of universal knowledge, we decided to appropriate Mondothèque as a frame of reference. Imagined by Paul Otlet in 1934, La Mondothèque was to be a ’thinking machine’: archive, link generator, desk, catalog and broadcast station at the same time. The dreamed capacity of Mondothèque to combine scales, perspectives and media started to function as a diffraction device, as a platform to envision our modest but persistent interventions together.

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Presentation in the context of the Public Library, Multimedia Institute – mi2, Zagreb (Croatia).

With: Dušan Barok (Monoskop); Anthony Davies & Rosemary Grennan (MayDay Rooms); Kenneth Goldsmith; Sebastian Lütgert & Jan Gerber (Open Media Library); Alberto Manguel; Marcell Mars & Tomislav Medak (Multimedia Institute); María G. Perulero & Celia Gradín (Platoniq); Noa Treister (The Ignorant Schoolmaster and His Committees); Dubravka Sekulić; Što, kako i za koga / WHW.

In 1934, documentalist Paul Otlet wrote: “Humanity is at a turning point in its history. The mass of available information is formidable. New instruments are necessary for simplifying and condensing it, or the intellect will never know how to overcome the difficulties which overwhelm it, nor realise the progress that it glimpses and to which it aspires”. Otlet considered radio, cinema, micro-fiche, phonograph and television all worthy substitutes for the book as information carrier. He envisaged them interconnected into a ‘radiated library’, an intellectual multi-media machine that would support the publication, consultation and creation of knowledge.

From industrial heartland to the Internet age (screen-capture). Video published by The Mundaneum, 2014

Since 1993, the remains of Otlet’s extensive collection of documents are being cared for by The Mundaneum archive center in Mons. Located in a former mining region in the south of Belgium, Mons is also right next to Google’s largest datacenter in Europe. Due to the recent re-branding of Otlet as ‘founding father of the Internet’, and ‘visionary inventor of Google on paper’, The Mundaneum has called international attention to his oeuvre. The Internet giant thankfully accepted the gift of posthumous francophone roots, and adopted The Mundaneum in return.

‘The Internet on paper’ traces various narrations of media in and around the work of Paul Otlet. It is a contribution in the context of Mondothèque, a platform for experiments by artists, archivists and activists concerned about the state of infrastructures for knowledge production.

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Presentation March 18 in Bergen, Norway. Contribution to The extension of many, a seminar curated by Dušan Barok for BEK, Bergen Center for Electronic Arts.