The archives were established on August 28, 1821, by Governor Martín Rodríguez as the Buenos Aires Province Archive. The institution absorbed numerous historical archives, libraries, and other collections over the subsequent decades, and in 1957 acquired the National Print Archive, a bureau established in 1939. Its collections occupy around 14 km of shelf stacks, and the AGN is a member of the Memory of the World Programme, a UNESCO initiative. Operated by the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the AGN is organized into five departments:
Photographic Documents. Photographs dating from 1853 to 1983, totalling over 800,000, as well as the Witcomb Collection.
Library and Dissemination. Oversees partnerships with archives and kindred institutions from around the world, serves as liaison to journalists and researchers, publishes all archive newsletters and periodicals, and maintains the sum of the institute's bibliography. This department, in turn, includes:
*Bibliography Fund. 80,000 volumes, and a periodicals library of over 1,500 titles.
*Ernesto Celesia Collection.13,000 volumes dating from the 19th century, and from several countries in South America.
*José A. Pillado Collection. 1,044 tomes on Argentine and Western Hemisphere history.
*Juan Domingo Perón Collection. 4,000 volumes donated by the populist leader from his personal library.
*Periodicals Library. Magazine and newspaper issues from the 19th and 20th centuries.
Cinema and Media. Over 3,000 films, newsreels, Ampex tapes, and more recent multimedia items.
Intermediate Archive. Established in 1979, the library science arm of the AGN assists archives and libraries nationwide and elsewhere with the classification and curation of items. This office also maintains the bulk of documentation produced by the array of State enterprises, and was entrusted with these during President Carlos Menem's privatizations drive.
Headquarters
Housed within the former Congress building in 1906, the AGN was relocated to its present address at 246 Leandro Alem Avenue, upon the inaugural of the new Mortgage Bank building in 1950. The headquarters cannot house the entirety of its vast collections, which include over of shelves of documentation; the Intermediate Archive, for instance, was opened in another, nearby building. Plans were announced for the archives' transfer to the former ALEA Building, a Rationalist structure located behind the Alas Building that was ultimately sold to developer IRSA in 1998. Construction was approved in 2012 for a new main building for the AGN, designed by Fabio Estremera, Luciana Deschamps and Javier Gavernet, and to be located on the site of the former Caseros Prison in the Parque Patricios district.
