Abstract
This article presents a study examining digital collections in order to map resources available on digital platforms that influence user behavior and participation. By analyzing the collections’ interfaces, it identifies how artificial intelligence resources can relate different cultural objects within those spaces, working with different layers of information. These resources provide ways to overcome barriers between systems and the assumptions of their original cataloging, leading us to conceptualize digital objects as potential entangled objects. From this perspective, the article discusses the dual role of digital collections—as knowledge repositories and as mediation systems—while exploring viable alternatives for constituting collections within specific contexts of the Global South. To this end, the study presents an interface design, organized with computer vision techniques, arguing the importance of critical engagement with digital images and the intertwined dynamics in a decolonial approach on memory and technologies. It outlines implications for design practice, policy, and research globally.
Keywords
digital collections, archives, decolonial, artificial intelligence
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.882
Citation
Lopes, R., and Beiguelman, G. (2026) Entangled archives: Uncovering new connections in digital interfaces, in Simeone, L., Gray, C. M., Verhoeven, A., de Götzen, A., Bakırlıoğlu, Y., Zohar, H., Stead, M., and Buwert, P. (eds.), DRS2026: Edinburgh, 8–12 June, Edinburgh, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.882
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Included in
Entangled archives: Uncovering new connections in digital interfaces
This article presents a study examining digital collections in order to map resources available on digital platforms that influence user behavior and participation. By analyzing the collections’ interfaces, it identifies how artificial intelligence resources can relate different cultural objects within those spaces, working with different layers of information. These resources provide ways to overcome barriers between systems and the assumptions of their original cataloging, leading us to conceptualize digital objects as potential entangled objects. From this perspective, the article discusses the dual role of digital collections—as knowledge repositories and as mediation systems—while exploring viable alternatives for constituting collections within specific contexts of the Global South. To this end, the study presents an interface design, organized with computer vision techniques, arguing the importance of critical engagement with digital images and the intertwined dynamics in a decolonial approach on memory and technologies. It outlines implications for design practice, policy, and research globally.