Put this on display!

A lot of people ask me to display a particular item. In fact, if I had a dollar for every board member, volunteer, or deeply invested museum patron who asked me to put a particularly favorite artifact on display, I could retire from this field. Seriously. Well, slightly serious. I could at least buy a nice dinner.

Every time I’m accosted by one of these patrons, I ask them the same question: “Why?” And every time they give me the same answers: “I think (insert particularly favorite artifact) is really pretty,” or, “I think people would really like to see it.” They have no proof of this, mind you, besides a few friends who bear them their passion. Which is amazing, because invested patrons are so absolutely convinced that their particularly favorite artifact be displayed that my denying its rightful place in the museum is like taking away their beloved pet.

The problem is, most of these particularly favorite artifacts just aren’t that particularly interesting to me, or anyone else. And what’s worse, they’re usually impossible to fit into the story I’m trying to tell. You see, museums used to display any object of curiosity. Themes, organization, or stories didn’t matter. In fact, the word museum itself comes from the Latin “mouseion,” which in addition to being the title of this blog, translates to “seat of the muses.” Ancient museums were places where learned men could view the myriad objects of antiquity on display and reflect about their beauty.

Some of today’s best museums started this way. There’s a museum in upstate New York that started from one woman and her doll collection. Henry Ford loved collecting industrial technology, and endowed a museum to show rows and rows and rows of it. He even named the museum after himself. Paintings, baseballs, farming equipment, no matter the object, someone collected them and hoped to display rows and rows and rows of them for generations to come.

But today, the meaning of “museum” has evolved. Museums are trying to humanize themselves, to tell stories, to share and interpret artifacts instead of simply showing stuff. Well, a lot of them are. There are still many people who weep at the sight of a favored object. And to some degree, they are our bread and butter. They are our founders, our board members, our repeat customers, and our incredibly invested patrons.

I just wish they’d stop asking me to display their favored artifact, or at least ask me to display one of mine.