Sens or Non-Sens of a Collection

by Suzanne Joly
Original text published in Parcours désordonné

Translated by Susan Avon

We live in a universe of objects and we each wind our way through it in our own way, according to different practices and customs. We surround ourselves with objects to fulfil needs whether they be utilitarian, emotional, intellectual, religious... and those we choose carry a mark, that of our identity. I will not dwell on the nature of these objects but rather on a system that links us to them, the collection.

My reasons for doing so are to clarify certain related human behaviours. It is why I ask you to approach it by what you know of it. The subject is so broad and so complex that it is best not to lose sight of oneself. If you are a collector, you will speak to me of your collection. If not, you will remember your aunt's collection of miniature elephants, of your childhood wish to build an herbarium (unfulfilled) or to collect foreign currencies, of your cousin who spends hours sorting through rare stamps, or of your neighbour who has entire cupboards filled with compartments containing thousands of neatly pinned bugs... and whatever else.

If you delve deep enough, you will recall visiting museums of fine art or of natural history, your discoveries, your disappointments. You are involved with one of them! The question of research is a preoccupation of yours, as is the development of its collection. In sharing your experiences, we list a host of possible collections of myriad objects, precious or worthless, even the most unusual; pretty soon stories of slightly off-the-wall collectors come out.

In short, we can state unequivocally that all natural objects known to man and any and all artifact are featured somewhere in either a museum or a private collection. ^[1]

Is there an order to this? What role does the collection play in the life of a person, of a group, in the history of man? Do we broach the question of the collection by its function or by its reason for being? I will approach it through the collector himself. Why does he collect? To satisfy a need of possession, of prestige, to fulfil some proprietary instinct? Do other motives drive the activity such as the desire to know, exchange, create...

In La vie étrange des objets, Maurice Rheims describes it as an innate desire. Some animals exhibit astonishing behaviours. The thieving magpie lines its nest with objects that serve no useful purpose. The South-American viscacha strews various small objects pinched from his pack throughout his burrow which can extend over a few square kilometres. On the other hand, the child, from a very early age, has a particular relationship with the object and exhibits "reflect actions of the collector." He selects favourite objects and surrounds himself with them.

The child identifies with the object he has, plays with it as with a double who survives mischief without coming to harm, serves at once as scapegoat and protective amulet. Its existence confirms that of its owner, its plasticity enables the projection of all situations containing conflict. ^[2]

Later on, he takes pleasure in categorizing them: the first active collecting phase is between seven and twelve years old. At different developmental stages, his relationship with the object and his collecting behaviours change.

The child goes through a stage where his need to understand and his intellectual grasp of the world involve rationalizations that are expressed by the desire to categorize objects. ^[3]

In this collection system, the child collector assimilates the objects and, like the collector, he lives among and through them. You might just recognize yourself.

Throughout our lifetime, our relationships with the collection are many, whether they involve a private or a public collection, our own or another's. The collection is not a monolithic practice from which emanate certitudes, decrees. It is a multi-faceted system. If for some it is an occasional recreational activity, for others it is an uninterrupted process or one effected in stages throughout their lifetime. The experience is conducted by either mastering it, in an absentminded manner, or by diving right in so as to drown in it. But the act of collecting is always an adventure in which you are the hero. "Like the great hunters, collectors weave their exploits with more or less amazing yarns," ^[4] told with great relish. The adventure can be experienced as a "string of activities, experiences involving risk, novelty and to which we confer human value," ^[5] or as a trap where the riddles drive to isolation. It is to the collector, the "amateur", the "curious" and their mindsets that I draw your attention.

It is within an experimental lab on the collection that I became involved with the artists of Ateliers convertibles with the intention of gleaning some food for thought for possible future discussion. We never set out to do an exhaustive study, as the title of this publication asserts. In the end, the task of writing consists of making order out of the disorder and of building up a content. A keen sense of adventure and a deep belief in the creative potential of intersubjectivity are required. We used the subject to better understand the artist and his rapport with the object.

Having few of the character traits of a collector, I carefully observed those who more or less did. It is fascinating to note how, under the umbrella of the collection, exist all form of collectors of all nature and shape of artwork. Every collection is a curiosity and is captivated by its cataloguing methodology, the documenting of its specimens, the quality and quantity of its components. "The fascination that a collection holds lies in how little it reveals and how little it hides of the impetus which led to its creation." ^[6] The collector is an intriguing type. The time, energy and money invested is often limitless. There is always an ostentatious side to the venture. But what on earth arouses all this unbridled zeal? A search for order in the hazardous unfolding of our lives... Don't believe it.

"If the purpose of dreams is to ensure the continuity of sleep, objects ensure the continuity of life." ^[7] Can we save ourselves from collecting? To consider this propensity to collect and categorize objects as a hobby would diminish the importance of its role in the life of the collector. If the collection is an antidote to metaphysical anguish, a release valve, a guarantee of living on, it primarily foils the perception of chronological time. This time problematic is inherent to the collection. And it is by projecting real time onto a systematic dimension that the collector scoffs at the irreversibility of life.

Listing time in fixed intervals that he can play reversibly, the collection represents the perpetual starting-over of a controlled cycle where man gives himself over to each moment with great assurance, starting from any interval and certain of coming back to it, the game of birth and death. ^[8]

Any kind of object can be collected with the same fanaticism. If time is a fundamental function of the collection, the missing object or rather the search for what is missing is a positive leitmotif that fans this passion. Besides, incompleteness is what differentiates the collection from pure accumulation.

"The presence of the final object would, in effect, signify the death of the subject." ^[9] In fact, the activity serves to enhance his life. Does the collector isolate himself in a comfortable system, thus avoiding painful confrontation with certain disappointing realities? Is he attempting to fashion a private world where he controls the development and content? Discerning structure or grotesque monument, it is in the image of its owner. Italo Calvino compares the collection to a diary in which the collector records himself, day after day, object by object. Does this give him a certain freedom, that of a personalized handwriting?

It is because he feels alienated and volatilized in the social discourse of which the rules escape him that the collector tries to reconstitute a discourse that will be clear to him... ^[10]

The collector is sole master of his collection. His process is genuine: "A collection is an autobiographical domain, it traces the progress of an individual and of the community to which he belongs." ^[11]

In the act of collecting, some adapt to set rules, others manoeuvre at will following their own rules. Can we say as much of a society, of a community? The public collection affirms values, consensus and a social identity. The collection is only as complex as its author is. It serves as a reflecting pool, a prosthesis, a shield or a screen. The collector tells his story while telling himself stories, and adjusts the props as required. The collection is a structure grafted onto its owner, that we willingly see as a stable person, systematic, orderly, lucid, intelligent and tenacious; dissecting the "subject" also reveals a person prone to excess, compulsive, obsessed and sick.

There is no classical collector type. Does collecting contribute to the sanity of those who collect? Does collecting allow a relative freedom or does it incite alienation? In and of itself, it has no colour or flavour. It can just as well be a site of intellectual rigidity or fertile ground for the development of creative sensibilities. Of the phenomenon, we often only see the tip of the iceberg. Throughout the ages, nobility and the wealthy have collected. Today, everyone, without discrimination, can enjoy it. The practice thus finds itself more diversified.

Could this particular behaviour be hereditary since we find that, in collectors' families, the children venture into it more readily? They repeat familiar learned behaviours. There is no collector gene.

If the collection is a banner of an ability, then it is also a theatre for serious personal failures on a psychological as well as on a social scale. There are as many kinds of collectors as there are collections. An examination of the phenomenon revealed a paradox. Getting close to it has spoiled my current gaze on the world (this world of objects).

At the onset of the experience, the collection is what drew my attention--it seemed to hold all the secrets. Later, I was captivated by the collector --so many riddles emanated from him. The collection is at once organized system, architecture, organigram and living organism. Its self-sufficiency makes it particularly attractive. The collector makes up an oeuvre from objects to which he has assigned a value. Therein lies the question, around these objects full of connotations which create such different languages, permeable or impermeable, creative or redundant.

For me, everything shifted from the moment when I also perceived the collection as a stage production evolving from mentally deficient or disturbed behaviours. In the beginning, I worked at seeing it as a therapeutic pastime, then I discovered just as many instances of eccentricity and pathological behaviours. The author Maurice Rheims cites several rivetting examples. An English aristocrat collected hangmen's nooses, each accompanied by a biographical note. The story does not say how his life ended... Suspended?

Many seek in the act of collecting an atmosphere of clandestineness. ^[12]

A numismatist invested a small fortune in his collection. In order to have the sums of money required to buy rare and expensive coins at his disposal, he misled his wife all his life about the amounts spent. He feigned serious health problems, made up fictitious visits to specialists and used the pretext of exorbitant fees to explain his spending. It was not until after his death that his covert activities were uncovered. Someone approached his widow about some priceless coins which brought to light the inestimable monetary value of the collection.

There are also some strange stories about massive accumulations of newspapers, cases of maniacal "collectionitis." A seemingly well-adjusted businessman had subscriptions for hundreds of French and foreign daily newspapers. They were found, carefully sorted and stacked, in nine rooms in his apartment. Realistically, most had never even been looked at.

This story of two New-Yorkers is one of sheer neurosis:

Living together in a small apartment, they went out every day to buy groceries and the newspapers. For years, they didn't seem to have anything else to do other than to read tens of daily newspapers. When the building superintendent hadn't seen them for a few days, he alerted the police; they were found dead, killed by poisonous fumes from faulty heating, lying on piles of papers. The state of the apartment was indescribable. Right up to the ceiling, piles of carefully tied-up newspapers filled four rooms. No furniture, or chair, or table. No bed, they slept comfortably between metre-high piles of newspapers. No covers, the paper kept them warm. There were only two ever-narrowing and dangerous passageways, one leading to the bathroom, the other to the front door. ^[13]

I don't know where all this is leading me, but I feel a certain uneasiness. How to justify what I have written without sounding "in praise of flight"? Is the collection a defense mechanism in the face of adversity, a playground where sense and nonsense are on equal footing, unfolding all these fascinating and worrisome intimate areas?

Notes

1. Free Translation, Krzysztof Pomian, Collectionneurs, amateurs et curieux, Paris, Gallimard, 1987, p. 15.
2. Free Translation, Maurice Rheims, La vie étrange des objets, Paris, Plon, 1959, p. 25.
3. Free Translation, Rheims, p. 26.
4. Free Translation, Rheims, p. 43.
5. Free Translation, »Aventure», Le Nouveau Petit Robert, Paris, Dictionnaires Le Robert, 1994.
6. Free Translation, Italo Calvino, Collection de sable, Paris, Seuil, 1986, p. 14.
7. Free Translation, Jean Baudrillard, Le système des objets, Paris, Gallimard,1968, p.137
8. Free Translation, Baudrillard, p. 135.
9. Free Translation, Baudrillard, p. 130.
10. Free Translation, Baudrillard, p. 149.
11. Free Translation, Chantal Pontbriand, »Collections : Visions d'avenir», Parachute, no 54, mars-juin 1989, p. 6.
12. Free Translation, Rheims, p. 46.
13. Free Translation, Rheims, p. 55.

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