ter.ri.to.ri.al.i.ty n. The behavior of a male animal that defines and defends its territory. cu.ra.to.ri.al.i.ty™ n. The behavior of a curator that defines and defends his collection and its history.
THE FINAL CHAPTER… FOR NOW
So here we are long last, at the end of our year-long journey through American pop culture and entertainment via the hallowed halls of Geppi’s Entertainment Museum. This is my last installment of Curatoriality™ for this newsletter (although the column will probably continue, in one form or another, via my own Web site at www.apanelwithnoborders.com or… wait for it… www.curatoriality.com!), and I wanted to take this opportunity to offer some last thoughts on where we are and where we’re going. What have we learned from our trip through over 250 years of toys, comics, books, posters, and collectibles of every category?
I thought a lot about what bits of wisdom I might have to impart before we say goodbye – future trends in pop culture, what characters from the past might enjoy a renewed life in years to come, tips on what to collect and when – but then I thought about the title of this column and it came to me.
In the very first installment of this column, I discussed my choice of the coined term “curatoriality” for this series, noting that as the curator of a museum devoted to pop culture, comic characters, and entertainment, it’s my responsibility to define and defend the integrity of our collection and the history it represents. But in a way, all collectors are curators, too, preserving and defending their own slice of pop culture against elements both physical and ephemeral. And there’s a word that leads me to my next point: ephemeral.
The challenge that so many of us face as pop culture collectors is that the material we cherish is transitory, composed of paper and ink and wood and subject to aging, decomposition, and, ultimately, disintegration. It’s not a pleasant prospect, but the future may be even more troubling. Our greatest obstacle today in the battle to define and defend the integrity of our shared cultural heritage is that we are moving more and more of that experience into the digital world and leaving all tangible artifacts behind.
Kids today (now I feel like an old man) manage their entire entertainment lifestyle via the impossible-to-hold medium of ones and zeros. They listen to music or watch movies and TV on their iPods and laptops, go online to blog and game and read, download this and that, upload another, and before you know it, there’s no material residue of culture at all. Take a look at the current situation in the DVD market – thanks to an unnecessary format war and the not-so-slow encroachment of a very different sensibility toward physical media, we may soon see entertainment delivered to us entirely through the Internet, with nothing to hold onto unless you actively choose to burn a disc or otherwise store all that data. The likes of Superman, Mickey Mouse, and Bugs Bunny are all being disassembled and beamed across the ether as particles like Mike Teevee in the hidden halls of Wonka’s factory.
And what will this mean to preserving pop culture history? With nothing to actually collect, nothing to place on a shelf or in a glass case, what will be left to show us where we’ve been, what we enjoyed, who we are? Or will museums too go completely virtual, with screens on the wall in place of cases, and downloadable images instead of artifacts? Will there even be a need to curate the past, since everything may still be available out there somewhere, on demand and ready to view with the click of a mouse? Maybe our world of entertainment will become a never-ending archive, susceptible to hard drive crashes and server failures instead of water and temperature and dust.
I don’t have any answers to these questions, but I thought they were worth bringing up since we’re standing at the edge of the old world and peering myopically at the horizon, hoping to catch a glimpse of the new. We may not be able to see it clearly from here, but we can feel which way the wind is blowing. Pop culture may go on, and characters may be reinvented ad infinitum, but one day soon the notion of collecting (and curating) may transform forever.
Until then, I hope that through this column I’ve given you a tantalizing look at our museum’s mission via all the wonderful exhibits we have on display, as well as through the historic, thematic, and cultural trends that we’ve tried to capture and reflect throughout our timeline.
I also hope that through these articles, you’ve been inspired to take a personal journey to visit us here at the museum and see some of your own childhood in person. It’s all waiting for you right here at Geppi’s Entertainment Museum, the home of “pop culture with character!”
or in person at
301 W. Camden St.
Baltimore, MD 21201
(410) 625-7060
This is a guest article. The thoughts and opinions in this piece are those of their author and are not necessarily the thoughts of the Certified Collectibles Group.
