Memory of project
What sort of primal impulse makes one become a collector? At what point the urge to keep becomes obsessive and occupies largely one's life?
Going through the strange, eclectic and fascinating collection of Claude Nobs, founder and past director of the Montreux Jazz Festival, the question of the fate of the objects and of the relative value of them arises vividly. One can see this "encyclopaedical" collection as an ethnographical radiography of the man. Through time he collected everything and anything obsessively. From 5 dollars objects bought on a street to paintings of recognized artists like Keith Haring. In his mountain chalet where this odd collection can be found, all these objects juxtapose chaotically, without a precise order or hierarchy. Rather, the objects seem to live at the rhythm of Claude Nobs' life, without a thoughtful agenda or plan, being removed or moved around continuously.
"Everything remembered, everything thought, all awareness becomes base, frame, pedestal, lock and key of his ownership. Period, region, craft, previous owners - all, for the true collector, merge in each one of his possessions into a magical encyclopedia whose quintessence is the fate of his object."
Walter Benjamin, The Arcades Project
For the 2013 Montreux Jazz Festival the idea of creating a new space to expose publically part of this collection was matured and seemed a necessity in order to pay an immediate tribute to the defunct director.
A team of designers - BUREAU A - and curators - Veronica Tracchia and Mauricio Estrada Muñoz - was commissioned the urgent task to develop an exhibition project and to bring it to realization in a rather short period of time. THE COLLECTION concept emerges from the idea of a dynamic exhibition, one that can be looked at and listened to, but also on that can be manipulated continuously, accepting change with a sort of non-sacral relation to the exhibited objects.
As a rather subtle reference, the library is conceived completely in wood to recall the warm and intimate atmosphere of Nobs chalet. The structure is as obsessive as the collector's mind. Based on a unique wood beam section and assembled in a very repetitive manner, with the rigour of a minimal sculpture.
The space surrounding the library is a quiet but slightly decadent living room.
Texto.- Bureau A
CREDITS.-
Designers.- Bureau A.
Curators.- Veronica Tracchia and Mauricio Estrada Muñoz.
Venue.- Montreux Jazz Festival, Montreux, Switzerland.
