At Large in the Empire of Things: The Museum of Sundry Objects

Abstract

Abstract The Museum of Sundry Objects, located in Sólgarður, about 25 kilometers north of Akureyri, offers a site to think carefully about a number of key elements of museum practice, including the logic of collection, the practice of object “array,” and the role of the museum “heroic” object. Where the heroic object directs one to move from the individual to the imagined array, the array opens a different set of possibilities for recognizing the singularity of objects. In addition, a close examination of the Sundry suggests that “the museum” may simply be one stage of many in the ongoing life of the object, an extended liminal phase that offers a number of opportunities for the re-enlivening of the objects, a different set of steps on the path of the inbetween.

Keywords

• array, heroic object, slow events, liminality, inbetweenness, collections