The Bolo Museum issues a “missing computer” bulletin
© EPFL / Alain Herzog
The Mémoires Informatiques foundation has entirely re-worked the set of the Bolo Museum, housed in the computing section of EPFL. "Scheduled disappearance", the new temporary exhibition, whose public opening will take place this evening, enables us to understand the evolution of computers up to their current ubiquity and the adaptation of the society to an fully computerized world.
Computers have become so much part of our environment that they now tend to … disappear! Miniaturized and multiplied, processors are now hidden in most of the objects we encounter in everyday life. As a result, there are now very few requirements for large, centralizing machines.
This observation was the starting point for the development of the new exhibition of the Mémoires Informatiques Foundation, located at EPFL and whose "treasure" is made up of over one thousand computers, as well as numerous books and software products. “Scheduled disappearance” takes the form of a vast network of questions and answers, clues, suspects and culprits, which bring to light some of the most remarkable elements of the exhibition. “We imagined the presentation as a kind of mind map where the visitors themselves are encouraged to conduct the enquiry into this disappearance”, explains Yves Bolognini, the president of the Foundation with responsibility for the museum.
The other side of the wall is a gigantic window, a “showcase of curiosities” where you can discover some of the computers which made history.
A reflexion on society
The task of creating the new set for the Bolo museum was assigned to Oxyde, the Lausanne design studio. While examining this wall, going from one clue to the next, the visitor not only witnesses the evolution of the machines, but also the more and more symbiotic relationships that human beings have with them. “We wanted to present more than a mere technological exhibition”, adds Yves Bolognini. “Computing has become so important in our societies that it seems necessary to step back a little and take stock, to understand how we got here and to imagine how it will continue to evolve.”
Access to the museum is free when the building (plan) is open – Mondays to Fridays, except holidays. Guided tours can be requested from the volunteers of the aBCM ("amis du Bolo's Computer Museum) through their website.