Deep Deep Down

Collections are only exhibited to a small extent. Much of the art rarely sees the light of day, if ever. Such catacombs are no catastrophe. For better or for worse, they are the norm. Such is the nature of collections: moments of display are dazzling states of rare exception.

One can maximise such states of exception, unearth selected items, bring them to light, curate them as generously as possible. After all, what’s commendable about the Mudam Collection is its sheer heterogeneity.

But what if we rendered more obvious a collection’s natural state of being instead? Not to mourn its life in the shadows but to make it tangible, visible, understandable. And sensational. In every sense of the term. What if we worked with the given state of affairs as honestly as possible, offered an homage to the collection as is?

To do so, one would need to prioritise the collection as a vast and silent landscape, over and above the quality of selected work. One would use quantitative criteria instead of thematic or formal ones. One would also embrace the tools at one’s disposal – crates, Excel files, JPEGs, backstage devices – as clearly visible parts of the curatorial process.

What is more urgent is the attempt to turn the collection into something you can grasp intellectually and physically. To turn this weird, terrific, spectacular, luxurious, intimidating upshot of European Modernity that we call a public collection into something more than an inventory or a press release.