The Meneghello Archive originates from the awareness that a work does not coincide with its material object. Each work is part of a broader research practice in which works, texts, images, projects, notes, models, documents and processes constitute different manifestations of the same investigation.
For this reason, the archive is not conceived as a repository or as a chronologically ordered collection, but as a relational space. The works are not organised according to a temporal sequence, since Simone Meneghello’s research does not recognise time as a principle capable of determining their meaning. Each work has the same status as all the others: it could have been made today or twenty years ago, or belong to a project still in progress. Dates describe a material event only, without establishing hierarchies, developments or points of arrival.
The Meneghello Archive therefore takes the form of an open system in continuous transformation, in which every element remains constantly related to the entire body of research. Consultation does not follow a linear path; instead, it constructs a network of connections capable of bringing works distant in time into dialogue with preparatory materials, theoretical reflections, exhibitions and new projects.
The archive includes a physical component, consisting of the works and original documentation; a digital component dedicated to cataloguing and conservation; and an online platform designed to make the research heritage progressively accessible. These three dimensions are not autonomous, but form a single organism in continuous evolution.
Particular attention is devoted to processes. Drafts, sketches, models, installation photographs, notes, texts, algorithms, project reports and preparatory materials are not ancillary documentation, but integral parts of the research. The archive preserves not only what a work becomes, but also the language through which it takes shape.
From this perspective, the archive itself is never definitive. Every new work modifies its relationships with those that precede it, and every new reflection redefines the reading of the whole. The Meneghello Archive is therefore a living organism, capable of transforming itself without losing its identity, while keeping open the possibility of new connections, new interpretations and new modes of access.
At present, the Meneghello Archive is not established as an autonomous legal entity and is managed by the Meneghello family, who oversee its conservation, expansion and development with the aim of ensuring its continuity, integrity and accessibility over time.