From Collecting to Connecting: Post-Custodialism or How We Might Fill Gaps in Architectural Knowledge

Monday, March 3, 2025 from 6:00 pm to 7:30 pm

• In-person event
• The Pit, Architecture Building, Carleton University
• 1125 Colonel By Drive, Ottawa, ON, K1S 5B6

• Contact
• Maria Cook, mariacook3@cunet.carleton.ca, 613-520-2600

How to decolonize a collection or an institution? What does that mean? Martien de Vletter is the Associate Director, Collection at the Canadian Centre for Architecture. In this lecture, she will offer alternatives to collecting and making resources available to the public.

This represents a shift from the custodial tradition, where archives are maintained by collecting institutions, to an alternative model where they are retained by their creator with institutions providing support.

With this lecture, de Vletter wants to share the experience of when we connect rather than collect. She proposes other ways of learning, that contribute to a shift in museum culture in general, informing CCA’s collaborations going forward.

About Martien de Vletter
Martien de Vletter joined the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) in 2012 as Associate Director, Collection. She is responsible for acquisitions, collection care, and management, descriptions of, and access to the collection.

De Vletter currently works on projects related to Critical Cataloguing and Reparative Descriptions as well as new models of non-extractive collaborations.

She studied architecture history in Amsterdam, worked as a Chief Curator at the Netherlands Architecture Institute (2001-2008), and was publisher of SUN Architecture Publishers Amsterdam (2008-2012).