🧸 Nifel, 2022
Collaboration with Selin Göksu
Photo credits 1 - Julian Lee Harather
Photo credits 2 - Christoph Wimmer-Ruelland
In the late Renaissance and in the Baroque period, cabinets of curiosities with their treasures, such as ivory carvings, mounted ostrich eggs, animal preparations or Chinese porcelain, were the forerunners of today's museums. Soon it was no longer enough for the citizens to marvel at the wondrous objects behind glass; they also wanted to track down special exhibits, own them and display them in their own homes. This was the beginning of the cultural phenomenon of collecting, which is defined as the systematic search, procurement and storage of things.
The “Neue Zürcher Zeitung” once wrote that there is magic in every collection. Old and curious things could thus be rescued from their former insignificance and - equipped with a new aura - transformed into objects for museum viewing.
The display proposed lets you keep that spark; the excitement of owning little treasures, often only valuable to ourselves due to the emotional importance we accord to certain objects.
Throughout our lives, we come across owning a huge amount of things, some of which we have difficulties to let go, and others we want to have close us at any cost. In order to keep these, we often fill up boxes and storages just because we can’t let go of our little symbols and the memories that go with them. Only the elite gets to be displayed in our own four walls, slowly loosing this special emotional value by becoming part of our everyday life, blending in with our surrounding, becoming less and less noticed. Our cabinet combines the special feeling of rediscovering long forgotten companions, feelings and memories while throttling the visual importance of the displayed objects.
The material used to form the panels (acrylic glass, satin, 80% light transmission) distorts the content leaving you with shapes and colors of your well known objects, without letting you see them clearly. This blurriness can be varied by positioning your exhibits closer or further from the front panels, leaving you to decide how clear of an image you want to produce. What you are showing are “ghost of the past”, unclear images like far away memories in your head. You know how they look like, you have the approximate shape and color in front of you eyes, but can’t quite grasp the details and the outlines.
For a clear vision, you have to actively seek for it. The structure of the display has certain cut-outs and openings to peak inside; to catch a glimpse the exhibits as whole objects from a far, or to examine the details up close, rediscovering your emotional belongings every time anew
Collaboration with Selin Göksu
Photo credits 1 - Julian Lee Harather
Photo credits 2 - Christoph Wimmer-Ruelland
In the late Renaissance and in the Baroque period, cabinets of curiosities with their treasures, such as ivory carvings, mounted ostrich eggs, animal preparations or Chinese porcelain, were the forerunners of today's museums. Soon it was no longer enough for the citizens to marvel at the wondrous objects behind glass; they also wanted to track down special exhibits, own them and display them in their own homes. This was the beginning of the cultural phenomenon of collecting, which is defined as the systematic search, procurement and storage of things.
The “Neue Zürcher Zeitung” once wrote that there is magic in every collection. Old and curious things could thus be rescued from their former insignificance and - equipped with a new aura - transformed into objects for museum viewing.
The display proposed lets you keep that spark; the excitement of owning little treasures, often only valuable to ourselves due to the emotional importance we accord to certain objects.
Throughout our lives, we come across owning a huge amount of things, some of which we have difficulties to let go, and others we want to have close us at any cost. In order to keep these, we often fill up boxes and storages just because we can’t let go of our little symbols and the memories that go with them. Only the elite gets to be displayed in our own four walls, slowly loosing this special emotional value by becoming part of our everyday life, blending in with our surrounding, becoming less and less noticed. Our cabinet combines the special feeling of rediscovering long forgotten companions, feelings and memories while throttling the visual importance of the displayed objects.
The material used to form the panels (acrylic glass, satin, 80% light transmission) distorts the content leaving you with shapes and colors of your well known objects, without letting you see them clearly. This blurriness can be varied by positioning your exhibits closer or further from the front panels, leaving you to decide how clear of an image you want to produce. What you are showing are “ghost of the past”, unclear images like far away memories in your head. You know how they look like, you have the approximate shape and color in front of you eyes, but can’t quite grasp the details and the outlines.
For a clear vision, you have to actively seek for it. The structure of the display has certain cut-outs and openings to peak inside; to catch a glimpse the exhibits as whole objects from a far, or to examine the details up close, rediscovering your emotional belongings every time anew
