Embarking on our Mission of Glorious Obscurity
September 30, 2023 4:42 PM Subscribe
The Museum of Everyday Life is an ongoing revolutionary museum experiment based in Glover, Vermont. Its mission is a heroic, slow-motion cataloguing of the quotidian–a detailed, theatrical expression of gratitude and love for the minuscule and unglamorous experience of daily life in all its forms.
"We celebrate mundanity, and the mysterious delight embedded in the banal but beloved objects we touch everyday. In pursuit of this mission, some of the questions we ask ourselves are: What would it be like to imagine a museum filled, not with exotic objects, but with perfectly familiar ones? What would it look like to defy the commodity-based model of collection and display? And how might it be possible to create massive participatory collections of objects in a way that illuminates the back and forth dance, the essential, vibrant relationship between objects and people?"
"We celebrate mundanity, and the mysterious delight embedded in the banal but beloved objects we touch everyday. In pursuit of this mission, some of the questions we ask ourselves are: What would it be like to imagine a museum filled, not with exotic objects, but with perfectly familiar ones? What would it look like to defy the commodity-based model of collection and display? And how might it be possible to create massive participatory collections of objects in a way that illuminates the back and forth dance, the essential, vibrant relationship between objects and people?"
I feel seen.
posted by srboisvert at 5:48 PM on September 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by srboisvert at 5:48 PM on September 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
I feel curated.
posted by clavdivs at 7:12 PM on September 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by clavdivs at 7:12 PM on September 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
I love that place. Truly magical. It feels like something from a better world than the one we live in.
One thing to know if you're in the neighborhood is that it's real close to the Bread and Puppet Theater Museum, which is more than worth your time, especially if you like enormous community-focused socialist surrealist ritualistic puppet theater, and who doesn't?
posted by slappy_pinchbottom at 8:29 PM on September 30, 2023 [4 favorites]
One thing to know if you're in the neighborhood is that it's real close to the Bread and Puppet Theater Museum, which is more than worth your time, especially if you like enormous community-focused socialist surrealist ritualistic puppet theater, and who doesn't?
posted by slappy_pinchbottom at 8:29 PM on September 30, 2023 [4 favorites]
This museum is a treasure. I've been twice and it was such a delight each time.
posted by kokaku at 12:01 AM on October 1, 2023
posted by kokaku at 12:01 AM on October 1, 2023
I was just there two weeks ago to see the Wheels exhibit. Since then I have had some email back and forth with Clare about adding to the collection.
The museum is so Vermont. No guards, no ticket takers... turn on the lights when you come in and turn them off when you leave. Not fancy- in a barn. And amazing, everyday things.
Just like it says on the tin.
posted by MtDewd at 3:43 AM on October 1, 2023 [4 favorites]
The museum is so Vermont. No guards, no ticket takers... turn on the lights when you come in and turn them off when you leave. Not fancy- in a barn. And amazing, everyday things.
Just like it says on the tin.
posted by MtDewd at 3:43 AM on October 1, 2023 [4 favorites]
I love the look of it and the instructions to turn the lights on when you enter and off when you leave. Very tempting to get metaphorical about that…
I also came to drop in a mention of Theodore Zeldin’s “An Intimate History of Humanity”. This relates (mostly) not to objects, of course, but to people. I can’t frame the content better than the preamble to the first chapter: “How humans have repeatedly lost hope, and how new encounters, and a new pair of spectacles, revive them”. Zeldin’s doing a sort of anthropological biographical transect, and mining out the magical bits of the practice of everyday life and emotion. He’s also the author of a book entitled The Hidden Pleasures of Life, which I haven’t yet read, but which seems likely enough to give satisfaction if the above is intriguing.
posted by aesop at 5:43 AM on October 1, 2023 [1 favorite]
I also came to drop in a mention of Theodore Zeldin’s “An Intimate History of Humanity”. This relates (mostly) not to objects, of course, but to people. I can’t frame the content better than the preamble to the first chapter: “How humans have repeatedly lost hope, and how new encounters, and a new pair of spectacles, revive them”. Zeldin’s doing a sort of anthropological biographical transect, and mining out the magical bits of the practice of everyday life and emotion. He’s also the author of a book entitled The Hidden Pleasures of Life, which I haven’t yet read, but which seems likely enough to give satisfaction if the above is intriguing.
posted by aesop at 5:43 AM on October 1, 2023 [1 favorite]
What would it be like to imagine a museum filled, not with exotic objects, but with perfectly familiar ones?
I visited the Museum two years ago, and they are being just a bit coy with a description like this -- it would be more accurate to say the exhibits can feature many exotic or artistic variations on perfectly familiar items. For example, when I went there was an exhibit on "dust", and among the features was an array of toneballs, accumulations of tightly packed balls of dust and hair collected by a luthier from various stringed instruments. There was also a tiny amount of moon dust sealed in a plastic box.
The paperclip exhibit included, IIRC, two dresses made almost entirely out of paper clips, as well as several dioramas of animals where paperclips had been used as the wireframes.
The toothbrush exhibit included antique versions, also some that had been made for kids in the 50s and 60s with garish colors and cartoon figures on the handle, and -- in a separate box -- toothbrushes from a prison facility that had been confiscated after they'd been sharpened into shivs and stabbing weapons.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 7:34 AM on October 1, 2023 [2 favorites]
I visited the Museum two years ago, and they are being just a bit coy with a description like this -- it would be more accurate to say the exhibits can feature many exotic or artistic variations on perfectly familiar items. For example, when I went there was an exhibit on "dust", and among the features was an array of toneballs, accumulations of tightly packed balls of dust and hair collected by a luthier from various stringed instruments. There was also a tiny amount of moon dust sealed in a plastic box.
The paperclip exhibit included, IIRC, two dresses made almost entirely out of paper clips, as well as several dioramas of animals where paperclips had been used as the wireframes.
The toothbrush exhibit included antique versions, also some that had been made for kids in the 50s and 60s with garish colors and cartoon figures on the handle, and -- in a separate box -- toothbrushes from a prison facility that had been confiscated after they'd been sharpened into shivs and stabbing weapons.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 7:34 AM on October 1, 2023 [2 favorites]
If I still lived in Massachusetts I'd be right over. This post reminds me of MeFi's early days in the best of ways. Thank you for posting.
posted by rabia.elizabeth at 7:49 AM on October 1, 2023
posted by rabia.elizabeth at 7:49 AM on October 1, 2023
I do think Noah Smith is a ridiculous fool, and this concerns a Chinese museum not everyday life here, but this made me laugh..
"The tragedy of modern China is that they created the world's best statue, and then destroyed it because of NIMBYs"
posted by jeffburdges at 2:29 PM on October 1, 2023
"The tragedy of modern China is that they created the world's best statue, and then destroyed it because of NIMBYs"
posted by jeffburdges at 2:29 PM on October 1, 2023
I discovered the Museum of Everyday Life last summer, and I intend to make an annual pilgrimage as long as it’s open. What a weird and wonderful place! I’ll second the recommendation for the Bread and Puppet Museum, although be warned that it the surrealism can make it a terrifying experience.
posted by dehowell at 6:13 AM on October 3, 2023
posted by dehowell at 6:13 AM on October 3, 2023
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IIRC, the exhibit theme the first time we visited was matches.
posted by Kitteh at 5:07 PM on September 30, 2023