Really loved Jen’s visual artefact but I felt that there was something not quite right about the ‘cabinet of curiosities’ metaphor.
Cabinets of curiosities or Wunderkammern are collections of ’strange’ and ‘primitive’ artefacts – some natural, some hand-made - acquired and displayed by mainly wealthy collectors. They belong to a culture of aristocrats, gentlemen or aspiring gentlemen and are also part and parcel of the phenomenon of the grand tour. To be one of the curiosi, is to reveal a fineness of sensibility, an appreciation of the sublime but also an understanding of what’s really art – and what’s just … well … ’strange’ ( a ‘curiosity’). So, I see them as being one of the ways in which a particular class of men distinguished themselves aesthetically, and through this, socially.
Cabinets of curiosities reveal a fascination with the Other – with Otherness in all its forms – but reek of a patronising and superior attittude towards the cultures whose artefacts are collected.
I don’t think Jen’s cabinet did this – I suspect her digital cabinet of curiosities is more informed by surrealism and its reappropriation of the wonder cabinet to articulate an aesthetic based partly on the strange (”the beautiful is always strange”, said Baudelaire) and on bizarre juxtapositions. There’s a nice scene in André Breton’s Nadja (1928) where the narrator describes his trips to the flea market (I think it’s the one at Clignancourt – still open, Métro Porte de Clignancourt): “on the lookout for these objects one cannot find anywhere else, outmoded, fragmented, unusable, almost incomprehensible, ultimately perverse in the way I appreciate it or like it”.
Breton, by the way, had an amazing cabinet of curiosities, bits of which (maybe all, I’m not sure) can be seen in the Pompidou centre.
Anyway, all this to say that I think the cabinet of curiosities/Wunderkammer is not simply a collection of objets trouvés but found objects of a strange, grotesque, and hybrid quality that are always Other.
Maybe commonplace book is a better metaphor?
I hadn’t thought deeply about the implications for power and the gaze of my choice of metaphor, because the museum sector (where I did some research last year) seems to throw it around in a fairly relaxed fashion, but I am now! Tracy suggested that a patchwork quilt might have been a good metaphor, but I think after reflecting that I am more comfortable with the less comfortable cabinet.
For one thing, the feeling of creating the lifestream has something of wanting to be seen to be discerning & clever, and I did want to capture that self-representative quality.
Also, I think I am turning my gaze on the Others (the students) in my ‘collection’. And my gaze and choice has a meaning in the context of this course apart from just juxtaposition and whimsy (which also feature, I hope). And I am aware of that to the extent that I considered not adding student-generated material to my lifestream in the first place.
Illeris (2005) writes about the disciplined eye in museum education – http://www.le.ac.uk/ms/m&s/Issue%2010/2%20Illeris.pdf , and I think this is relevant to the discussion at hand:
“The aim of museum and gallery education, if anything, becomes one of exposing the presumably disciplined and humble eye of the newcomers to impressive experiences and making them strive towards the connoisseur’s eye of the expert as the almost unattainable aim of their perceived need for education.” (19)
Maybe to be collected (especially by someone with some power in a given context) is to be disciplined. So you might not want to let me off the hook just yet.
@jen
Hi Jen, thanks for the great comments – almost a blog post in themselves. I guess I wanted to make the point that the metaphors we use are never neutral and that the ‘cabinet of curiosities’ comes packing a whopping ideological payload (wealth, status, social distinction, the gaze of the powerful over the Other etc.). I think the European tradition of collecting – of which cabinet of curiosities is one variant – reveals some interesting politics (about power, prestige, national, class or racial superiority) that are hard to ignore. The quilt metaphor, on the other hand, seems to have a more positive politics (e.g. about women’s often hidden or under-represented artistry). BTW, thanks for the Illeris article which I found really interesting. The bit you cite though is her summary of a particular conceptualisation of the museum – and the contruction of the museum audience – that Illeris seeks to problematise.
Re Illeris – yes, sorry – should have made it clear that she was being ironic.
Re the non-neutrality of metaphors – yes yes yes! I’m glad this has come up in relation to our visual artefacts.
Thanks, Tony.
And ‘How to make an American Quilt’ is such a lovely film
. Actually I mentioned quilting cos Sarah is a quilter – though I like the wimminz skillz angle too. The whole museum metaphor is loaded – museums are often about as P.C. as zoos, and many of the exhibits were stolen rather than acquired legitimately. Although I still like it, because I think there are controversies in lifestreaming too, with the echoes of a digital anthropology approach to culture (and we know how much trouble field anthropologists get into) so the metaphor reminds us to be careful.
@tracy
“Museums as PC as zoos” – yes, agree although possibly even less PC than zoos. I have a vague sympathy with Luis Bunuel (blimey, the surrealists are getting named checked a lot by me – and I don’t even like them!) who said he was more interested in blowing up a museum than visiting one! Ok, a little extreme but I think the antagonism to the sort of knowledge produced by the museum seems well placed.
I think that the quilting metaphore works here in the sense that a quilt is made up of tiny insignificant pieces, often too small to be useful, but pulled together with patience and skill can make a work of art. Much like our lifestream! All of the quotes and comments taken individually just look like a pile of scraps, but once we have finished with them… TA DA!!!
[...] – and their engagement with my own. I also found debating the hidden cultural politics of the ‘cabinet of curiosities’ with Jen to be really stimulating. So, sort of a week of disagreeing with the course team but in an [...]