Archive Khanah, part of SPACE21 Sound Gallery in Slemani, is an experimental archival project exploring Kurdish cassette culture. Using colour organization and gaming, it challenges institutional archives by emphasizing community-driven preservation. By redefining media circulation, diasporic memory, and sonic history, it demonstrates how displaced communities rely on alternative media to sustain cultural continuity. The project not only reimagines Kurdish archival structures but also deepens our understanding of how media circulates within and beyond Kurdish communities.

Hardi Kurda earned his PhD from Goldsmiths, University of London. He holds both a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree in Music Composition from the Academy of Music and Drama in Gothenburg and previously studied music at the Institute of Fine Arts in Slemani, Iraq. He is a founder of SPACE21, a contemporary and experimental sound and music festival in Iraqi Kurdistan, and the ARCHIVE KHANAH, an interactive sound archive project. He is the artist in residence at Sonic Matter Festival 2025, he was awarded the first artist in residence from King College University, Beyond 1932 in London, and he was the fifth Radio Art Residency in Halle, Germany, where he developed his works for radio.

Organized by the Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Music (CISM) and cosponsored by Ethnomusicology Forum.