Collections in Lofoten Homes is a project for LIAF 08, the Lofoten International Art Festival. Lofoten is an archipelago in the county of Nordland, in the north of Norway, lying within the Arctic Circle.
The project focuses on collecting and, particularly, on all kinds of collections found in the homes of the local inhabitants, aiming to connect the 25,000 population to the art festival.
It unfolds during the summer months of the festival, starting with a collecting survey open to the entire population and culminating in an exhibition and a publication. By way of an invitation Joshua Sofaer exhibited 350 of his own Mona Lisa Postcard collection as part of the LIAF exhibition.
Some people are collectors without really knowing it: corks tossed from opened bottles of wine into a bowl, or change from their pockets thrown into a jar of coins. Other people form collections without thinking about them as a collection: vinyl records of a particular singer, t-shirts, books. We are guardians of family collections in the form of heirlooms. We all form collections by writing things down: shopping lists, letters to friends, dreams. Then there are those people who collect objects, antiques, paintings and ephemera. Practically everyone is a collector of something.
Above all collecting is about passion. People labour much of their spare time searching garage sales and flea markets, junk shops and online auctions for the elusive ‘thing’ that they want to add to their set. Some people lock their collections away, others have them out on display. Some people categorise, label and index their collections, others simply order them so they look nice.
The world is a collection of collections: from the United Nations, which is a collection of states, to the child’s collection of stickers on the front of their jotter. Not since the Victorian era has Western culture been so obsessed with classifying, ordering and labelling. With the rise of the internet and specifically online auction sites such as eBay, collectors have unparalleled access to a global market. All kinds of people collect regardless of age, identity or background. The quirky nature of their acquisitions is shared in online groups and chat-rooms. Collections bring us together.
In an unruly world, there is something incredibly satisfying about seeing collections of things, separated by type, laid out next to each other. Collections place the individual in a community of material objects.