My experience with an Active Archive

Carson Hardstaff, student studying on the University of Essex Heritage and Museum Studies MA, joined the Warner Textile Archive to find out more about key figures in the history of textile company Helios, whose records reside at the Warner Textile Archive.

If there is one thing my master’s has taught me thus far, it is that nothing in heritage stands on neutral ground. Every act of restoration, cataloguing, designation, and definition brings with it decades of baggage, whether we are aware of it or not. I had this in mind when I started my module on Archives and Power. Power with a “P” was intentional. I learned that archives, like heritage as a whole, have a long history with power imbalance and power, benefits and suffers from it, has been at the core of scholarly debate for years. Archives and archivists still lack respect from academia and face belittlement from those who rely entirely on them to function. This module taught me the realities of archives and the nuances of archival thought. I always had a respect for archives, and after a term of excellent lectures, I began to feel like I understood the present position of archives. For me, the most significant thing I took away from this module was that archives are active places in academia, not just hoarders of dusty books and pottery shards. They create; archivists are scholars in their own right. Archives are alive.

This module presented me with two choices for the final assignment: an essay or a “PBO” (practice-based output). Wanting to broaden my experience within the heritage sector (and avoid another wordy essay), I chose the PBO. My decision was helped in part by familiarity with the BDMT, with whom I had the opportunity to volunteer in the summer of 2024, where I was convinced to change my master’s from history alone to Heritage and Museum Studies.

The task given to me by the archive was simple: “Here is a list of people and companies with links to Helios. Find out what you can.” As I have said before, I know nothing about textiles, so Helios was not a company I knew. The names on the list were also unknown to me, despite them being household names for those familiar with the arts, such as Graham Sutherland or Vanessa Bell. When I found information on these people’s lives, careers, and works, I needed to format the information into authorities—mini biographies with well-defined subheadings and a standardised format. Sophie, my “project manager” for this assignment, was confident that for half of these names I might find a date of birth and death and a sentence or two at best about their early life and career. We both underestimated the amount of information that could be found with a bit of digging. My list of 20 or so names quickly became six, as I simply did not have the time to create that many authorities. This is an important part of work at an archive. Archival projects are limited in scope, much the same as academia. It is the view of some scholars that archival work is quick and simple, monotonous data entry.

In truth, I was playing the role of a detective, piecing together a puzzle. The information was out there in the form of books or online articles, but no single place had all the information I needed. One article, for example, excluded the early life of Vanessa Bell as well as the scope of her work for the Bloomsbury Group. It took more digging to find out she was the sister of Virginia Woolf and that she had actually been a founding member of the Bloomsbury Group along with her siblings. I rode a carousel around books and articles, plucking information in handfuls until I had concentrated all the valuable material into neat authorities. I claimed I wanted to avoid a wordy essay, but this is the most work I have ever done for a single assignment.

While piecing together information, I consciously made note of any recurring themes or issues I encountered. Two stood out to me as especially important. The first was the diminished importance of textile and design work by people remembered primarily as artists. The second was the similarly diminished role of women.

While exploring articles on Graham Sutherland, I learned that he started his education and career as a printmaker and etcher. This influenced his later painting style. However, this information was often reduced to a footnote; sometimes it was not included at all. I read a short essay on Sutherland that pointed out how analyses of his art tend to start from the moment he put oil to canvas, rather than block print to paper. Similarly, Vanessa Bell spent a sizeable portion of her career designing textiles and furniture, yet most online articles I found only included photographs of her early paintings. It is not rare for textile design to be viewed negatively by art institutions. These artists were influenced by their work in design, yet several website biographies portrayed it as side work, something done in between the “real” art they became known for. The information I collected paints a different picture.

The second issue I encountered was the portrayal of women and their work. The women I researched faced patriarchal opposition throughout their careers, but long after their deaths, biographies still obscure or diminish their contributions. Vanessa Bell and Sylvia Priestley seem inseparable from their famous relatives. It is telling that Sylvia, who died Sylvia Goaman, is remembered in the context of her famous father, J. B. Priestley. Articles on Vanessa Bell often downplay her importance in the Bloomsbury Group in favour of Virginia Woolf. Dora Batty, who produced more than sixty posters for the London Underground during the interwar period, has little information available. Archives are well positioned to reclaim the position women have had in design, textiles, and art as a whole.

I thoroughly enjoyed my brief time working with the Warner Archive. It is a privilege to have had a part to play in the active archive. What I have learned here I will carry with me throughout my career in the heritage sector.