Collector Collecting Collections
We are all familiar with collections on some level. May it be that you are a person who collects snow globes from family vacations as a token of your experience, or a more unhealthy form of collection, hoarding. Those who hoard become so out of touch with reality through their means of collecting. The solace act of collecting is something I consider to be an art form. And I only say this because I was raised by two obsessive collectors.
Throughout my lifetime, my mother’s collection of choice seemed to be picking up hobbies. One day you could find her making jewelry and the next she would be painting quirky designs on leather bags. As time would go on she would get tired of her hobby and pick up a new one. Little collections of hand crafted pieces from each hobby are left dancing around the house. Most recently she has resided her comfort in collecting enamel pins — assembling a stock pile of around 100.
My father could be considered the master collector of the household. There is no limit to what he deems to be a collectors item. His collections are extreme; 400 pairs of sneakers, 150 baseball hats, 230 records, 70 ice cream scoops and 1520 ticket stubs. Each one is a huge part of his personality. You could also say his collections are experience oriented. Especially his ticket sub collection because they represent his saturated love for music.
Our basement storage closet is home to all of our lost collections. Old baseball cards, American Girl Dolls, posters from my fathers college dorm and children books from when my mom was a teacher. I find resonance with this. To me it symbolizes how collections can be synonymous with filling an absence. Collecting memories only to forget them. Collecting shoes to collect dust.
I found myself collecting in a different way. A big part of my childhood was going through the collections that amassed in my family. I would try to form my own collections, but they became easily disorganized piles of nothingness. As I have grown into myself and my design pathway, I have realized that this notion of “the collection” has manifested itself into my career. My head is constantly collecting imagery and archiving it to use as visual information for projects that I am working on. When I look for inspiration I tend to just think about my brain archive and find something cataloged in there. Maybe it’s the logo from my child hood toy store, a random scene from an episode of Arrested Development or a picture of hello kitty I found on Tumblr in 2012. These random modge-podge of things all contribute to the way I create. I think this is also why I love museums so much because they —in theory— are just massive collections of culture and art.
When I look back into my brain archive I always reference back to my dads record and CD collection. As much as I love music, it was never about that, rather the cover. The covers that I would reach for were the ones that I found to be the most visually interesting. Album art is special to me which is why I want to share with my most prized collection of graphic designers that are always in my head. These designers are infamous for their contribution to music through their art and I hope they leave the same impact on you that they have had on me.
