There are so many scenes of life in Los Angeles during coronavirus that we’ll never be able to shake: clear skies, empty freeways (and screenshots of an all-green Google Maps), empty beaches, crowded beaches, lines of cars at drive-throughs, lines of cars at drive-through testing sites and food banks, restaurants turned into marketplaces, the Venice Skate Park covered in sand, bioluminescent waves, 8 o’clock cheers for medical works. The library wants to save all of that in a digital time capsule—with your help.
The Los Angeles Public Library is creating a digital collection of life under lockdown. They’re inviting all Angelenos to submit photos, letters and diary entries (in digital form) that’ll be added to the library’s online special collections portal.
The library is specifically looking for files, screenshots and scans of the following: photographs; letters, emails, and other correspondence; journal and diary entries; blog posts or social media posts;
notices or signs; creative art such as drawings, paintings, and poetry.
All you have to do is head to the Safer at Home Archive page and you’ll find a submission form that asks for some basic details, including what exactly it is you’re sending in and where and when it was created. But it’ll also prompt you to write about what exactly this item means to you and your community, and how your life has changed during the pandemic (the library suggests thoughts on social distancing, telecommuting, changes to your daily routines or what it’s like to be an essential worker as some potential launching points).
A couple of housekeeping items: You’ll need to be at least 18 to submit something, and whatever you send will be entered into a Creative Commons license, meaning members of the general public would be free to share or adapt your submission.
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