La Contemporaine — Interview with Salomé Kintz

CML: Can you introduce La Contemporaine?

SK: La Contemporaine is a fairly special institution, part library, part museum, part archive center, specializing in the history of the 20ᵉ and XXIᵉ centuries. It is a century-old institution that was created at the time of the First World War with, from the start, the idea of collecting all types of documents on the history being made. We have very important collections, around 4 and a half million documents. This includes books as well as the press, posters, photographs, objects and paintings, and private archives as well. And all this in an international perspective. Here I am in charge of information and cultural action, since September since 2022. I arrived in 2019 to first take care of the communication. It is within the framework of these two functions that I was brought to work with the students of licence and master of the department Info-Com of Nanterre.

CML: What does this partnership consist of?

SK: It includes several activities. Each year, we train the Master students in a specific project. The idea is to work together towards a concrete achievement, which is useful to us as well as to them. One year, for example, we asked them to produce a web documentary to present La Contemporaine. Another year, they developed communication elements for high school students and teachers, an offer that we are just beginning to develop. This year, we are going to rely on the work of the students for our communication towards secondary schools. Their work has been extremely valuable to us. This year, the project that we would like to develop would be again turned towards secondary schools, around the creation of kits or cases of pedagogical mediation.

CML: What do you call pedagogical mediation kits?

SK: These are sets of documents and pedagogical objects that allow teachers to organize training sessions, all of which are ready to use, outside the walls or here at La Contemporaine. These materials, in connection with our collections, can also be digital. Let’s imagine, for example, a kit allowing the organization of a complete workshop on feminist struggles, or the Algerian war, in connection with the secondary school programs.

CML: What work do you do with license students?

SK: First, we introduce them to La Contemporaine and its heritage collections. They visit the space, the exhibition rooms and the first sessions are about the history of archives and the design of archives. Then, there may be work sessions focused more specifically on an archive collection. For example, we have worked on posters from May ’68 or Russia in 1917, and on communication methods for different audiences. This year, we propose to work on the boycott of the World Cup in Argentina in 1978. The idea would be to develop a game for high school students, a Twitter feed for the general public or posters for primary school students to tell this story and its issues.

CML: It’s easy to imagine what working with an institution like yours means for students. But for you, in your professional practice and as an institution, what does this partnership bring to you?

SK: A lot. From my point of view, as a librarian, it’s really interesting to work with young professionals, like the Master 2s are. They are already operational and their way of approaching the subjects allows to detect new problems. The advantage is also that their generation is aware of all the novelties concerning the practice of social networks, the new modes of communication and that certainly enriches us with an outside view. Thanks to them, we can realize that, perhaps, this or that offer is not very clear, unknown, not valued enough. They make us aware of the gaps and help us to promote the events proposed by the institution.

CML: What are the next events and exhibitions for La Contemporaine?

SK: This year, political graphics will be in the spotlight, with the next temporary exhibition, “A l’affiche! Claude Baillargeon”. Baillargeon was an independent graphic designer, very active in the 1970s to 1990s, close to the PS and the associative sector. The project follows an important donation to La contemporaine of a set of posters, models, photographic materials and archives that document his work. Around the exhibition, La contemporaine is offering a whole “graphic season” with regular meetings, conferences, screenings… On October 6, Charlotte Gould, professor of British civilization at Nanterre, will talk about the posters of the London feminist collective See Red Women’s Workshop. Don’t hesitate to come and discover our permanent exhibition, l’Atelier de l’histoire, a university museum that is interested in the source and the way history is written in the present time. Last year’s Master 2 group was very enthusiastic about promoting this exhibition to students and the general public…