Media Archaeology Lab at City Park Jazz, Sunday, July 17, 2016

On Sunday, July 17, from 5-8 p.m., at the Counterpath tent at City Park Jazz, we’ll host an exhibit of material from the Media Archaeology Lab at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Computers from the dawn of the digital as we know it, plus examples from major subsequent eras of media history, including lie detectors, will be on display, some of them plugged in and fully functioning for a time-warp experience not to be missed!

Jamie Allen’s new book with Counterpath, How to Build a Lie, will also be released at this event, with discounted copies available.

Founded in 2009 and generously supported by the College of Media, Communication and Information as well as the Department of English at the University of Colorado at Boulder, the motto of the Media Archaeology Lab (MAL)—located at 1320 Grandview Avenue in Boulder—is that “the past must be lived so that the present can be seen.” Nearly all digital media labs are conceived of as a place for experimental research using the most up-to-date, cutting-edge tools available. By contrast, the MAL – which very well might be the largest of its kind in the world – is a place for cross-disciplinary experimental research and teaching using still functioning media from the past. The MAL is propelled equally by the need to both preserve and maintain access to historically important media of all kinds – from magic lanterns, projectors, typewriters to personal computers from the 1970s through the 1990s – as well as early works of digital literature/art which were created on the hardware/software housed in the lab.