The Hidden Galleries Project has three main phases, the first of which involves charting, cataloguing and digitally copying examples of visual, cultural and literary religious materials confiscated by the secret police and identifying examples of the secret police visual and photographic representations of religious networks, materials and spaces. Currently, these materials are not easily searchable within the archives and access is restricted to accredited researchers. The project team has worked in three institutions primarily: Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security (ÁBTL), National Council for the Study of the Securitate Archives (CNSAS) and National Archives of the Republic of Moldova (which holds declassified personal files previously held by Archive of the Information and Security Service of the Republic of Moldova, the ex-KGB (ASIRM-KGB), accessing over 350 personal and documentary files. The key achievement of this phase of the project has been the construction of a Digital Database, which presents diverse examples of visual, literary and material religious items found within the secret police archives, with the aim of giving access to both researchers and members of religious communities. The Digital Database, which is still under development, is accessible via the project website (
http://hiddengalleries.eu/digitalarchive/s/en/page/welcome(opens in new window)). Currently the English language version is available but by the end of the project the Database will be in four languages: English, Romanian, Hungarian and Russian. There are currently 22 live entries with 80 entries planned for completion by the end of Phase 1 of the project in May 2019. Although the public and researchers can gain access to the secret police archives, the collections are generally not easily searchable for the kind of materials that the project focuses on such as confiscated photographs, surveillance photographs, brochures, icons, drawings, letters, hymns and diaries. The Database is already proving an invaluable tool for researchers and to help reconnect communities with items of lost cultural and religious patrimony.
As part of this first phase, the project also ran an academic workshop hosted by the Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security (ÁBTL), in Budapest on 11th September 2017 entitled Materialisng Religion in the Secret Police Archives: Methodological, Ethical and Legal approaches to the Study of Religions in Secret Police Archives. In addition to the project team, there were a number of additional invited speakers from Ukraine, Lithuania, Hungary, Serbia and Romania as well as members of the Research Department of ÁBTL. Full programme can be found on the project website:
http://hiddengalleries.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Budapest-Workshop-Programme-A4-Final-.pdf(opens in new window). An Edited Volume based on papers presented at the workshop which addresses the complex history of the relationship between the secret police and minority religious communities in Central and Eastern Europe as well as exploring the methodological, ethical and legal perspectives that shape scholarly use of the archives today is currently in preparation. In addition, the first Single-authored article by the Principal Investigator, Dr James Kapaló, exploring the methodology of the project has been peer-reviewed and accepted by the journal Material Religion and will appear in Volume 15 (2019) of the journal.
Following on from the archival work, ethnographic fieldwork with individuals and communities represented in the archives began in October 2017 in Hungary and June 2018 in Romania and Moldova. Making contact with, interviewing, reintroducing confiscated materials and negotiating participation in the project with religious groups constitutes the most challenging, sensitive and potentially impactful aspect of the project. The research team has so far succeeded in securing the cooperation or participation of six communities (two in Hungary, three in Romania and one in Moldova). Several members of these communities have indicated their intention to participate in events associated with them and to contribute to the public exhibitions which will be staged in the final year of the project. A number of others have been interviewed and are happy for their voices to form part of the public aspects of the project outputs. Having secured this vital cooperation and participation, the public exhibitions will include the narratives, performances and visual creative practices of the various groups.
The project team has presented the methodology of the project, case studies and findings at six international conferences in Hungary, Romania, UK, Belgium and Italy. In addition the project Principal Investigator, Dr James Kapaló, has given guest lectures in Edinburgh, Amsterdam and Budapest.
