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01/23/2025 | Campus-Meldung

UniArchive awarded the Hessian Archive Prize 2024

The Kassel University Archive has been awarded the Hessian Archive Prize 2024 and prize money of 5,000 euros. The Hessian Archive Prize, which is awarded by the Sparkassen-Kulturstiftung Hessen-Thüringen (Hesse-Thuringia Savings Banks Cultural Foundation) and presented by the Hesse State Association of the Association of German Archivists (VdA), is awarded annually to Hessian archives that have rendered outstanding services to securing, preserving and making archival material accessible.

Hand with file folder.Image: University of Kassel.
Here, staples are removed from documents to protect them from rust.
Image: Uni Kassel Archive

The dedicated team at the UniArchive, which was founded in 2023, is delighted with the news that the development project has been awarded the Hessian Archive Prize 2024. This verdict was reached last fall by an expert jury consisting of representatives from the Association of German Archivists, the Association of Hessian Municipal Archivists, the State Archive of Hesse, the Hessian Archive Advisory Service and the Sparkassen-Kulturstiftung Hessen-Thüringen. The prize, endowed with 5,000 euros, is awarded to Hessian archives that have rendered outstanding services to the safeguarding, preservation and accessibility of archive material. "With this prize, we want to honor the achievements of the Kassel University Archive and support the further development process. The new UniArchive strengthens the archival landscape in the entire region and serves as a role model for other scientific organizations in Hesse," said Dr. Peter Quadflieg, Chairman of the Hesse State Association of the VdA, explaining the reasons for the award.

Dr. Peter Wegenschimmel, Head of the UniArchive, expressed his surprise: "The UniArchive is still in its infancy. We are all the more pleased to receive this valuable recognition, which we see as a promotional award and encouragement to try out new approaches." The award is expected to be presented in May 2025 at UNI:Lokal.

A solid foundation

The UniArchive was established just in time for the University of Kassel's 50th anniversary. The UniArchive is an Office of the University Library with the task of securing, documenting and making available the cultural and scientific heritage of the University and its predecessor institutions. A special feature is the almost unique responsibility in Germany for the University of the Arts, where unique documents with the character of works are created. In 2023, the head of the archive was appointed. Together with Carina Nolte and Maika Lang, Dr. Peter Wegenschimmel laid the foundations for the young archive. A lot has been created since the foundation: the statutes, the user regulations, a documentation profile and the repatriation of the holdings from the Marburg State Archives, which have now grown to a running kilometer of archive material. The finding aids can even be searched publicly - an offer that users from all over the world are happy to accept. Bequests such as the holdings of clay construction pioneer Gernot Minke and collections such as the historical photo collection of the Communication and Marketing Office supplement the records of the Administration and Faculties.

Retaining knowledge

The development project is based on a clear guiding principle: archives are sustainable institutions. "Knowledge is the currency of a university," explains director Dr. Peter Wegenschimmel. Only a university archive can guarantee its long-term preservation. The idea of sustainability is behind the efforts of the staff at the University Archives to preserve archive-worthy documents in such a way that they will still be available to future generations. But archives are more than just dusty files. To support the digitization processes at the university, the UniArchiv operates a digital repository in cooperation with other university archives in Hesse. "We are helping to shape digitization because the easy availability of digital information creates the illusion of long-term availability," explains Wegenschimmel. In order to further expand the focus on sustainability, Wegenschimmel not only wants to take over more documents from the ecological working groups in 2025, but also research the history of sustainability in Kassel itself: "The presidency of the visionary Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker, the first chair for ecological agriculture, courses on ecological building - there are many threads of sustainability. With the help of our archives, we can unravel the tangle and write the history of sustainability in North Hesse."

Contact:

UniArchiv
Campus Library Holländischer Platz
Diagonale 10
34127 Kassel
archiv[at]uni-kassel[dot]de