ART AND MEMORY. THE INDIVIDUAL'S PERSONALITY IN THE SELECTION OF MEMORIES, AND THE RELIABILITY OF TESTIMONY: analysis of two case studies

Resumen

After a general introduction to the nature and functioning of human memory, this article focuses on two projects by French artist Sophie Calle - one of them developed as part of the Dislocations exhibition at MoMA, New York (October 1991/January 1992); the other, entitled Disparitions (1990), at the Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston - and the famous film The Thin Blue Line by American documentary maker Errol Morris, which allow us to discuss the important role, among other factors, that an individual's personality and social position play in the often involuntary selection of memories relating to the same object or perceived situation; a difference in the process of acquiring memories that significantly affects the reliability of testimony.