Keep the cache in memory

Beursschouwburg / Brussels, 1999

Mark1

13439 pictures, loop video, monitor
1min

Each Internet session leaves traces on our computers in the form of image files, brand logos, advertisements, various ads, graphic forms, texts, icons, videos, etc. Keep the cache in memory, is made up of these images which are regularly and automatically deleted from the RAM to make room for others when new connections are made on the web. These files accumulate in what is called the "cache memory" and could be considered as insignificant residues simply because we did not choose them. 

At the same time, images in the urban space reach us in our daily lives: on the edge between real information and visual pollution, they are nevertheless insidiously inscribed in our memory. For Keep the cache in memory these essentially volatile images from the Internet are captured and stored, ephemeral elements are preserved and archived in order to constitute a quantifiable memory. Retrieved by email from friends and acquaintances, the contents of the respective "caches" are here transcribed into short video sequences. On the screen, a large quantity of visual files appear chaotically at a rate of twenty-five images per second, while the speed at which the first names followed by a date are scrolled corresponds to the time spent by each person on the internet.