Friday, October 26, 2007

Taking Things Seriously -- the NY party

New York readers of Brainiac, I hope you will attend a party to celebrate the publication of "Taking Things Seriously," a book of photos and essays about "ordinary objects with extraordinary significance" that I co-edited with Brooklyn-based designer Carol Hayes.

WHEN: Friday, November 2, from 8 p.m. to midnight.
WHERE: HQ of the journal n+1, 195 Chrystie St. #200, in Manhattan near Chinatown
Click here to see the official invite

PS: I've been trying to not to self-promote too much via Brainiac. But I just have to share these recent reviews of "Taking Things Seriously."

* On October 17, the Boston Globe reviewed the book. Excerpt:

As the old sayings go, art is in the eye of the beholder and one person's junk is another person's treasure. "Taking Things Seriously" is a fun, off-center collection of objects and stories that will have you looking at the objects around you with fresh eyes and strange questions, like "Would Christopher Walken autograph my burned bagel?" or "Is it a good thing to get military ordnance for your birthday?"

Reviewer Chuck Leddy's use of the words "offbeat," "bizarre," "quirkiness," "bizarre" (again), and "off-center" indicates that he wouldn't want most of the contributors' objects in his own home. But he still praises the book! So: Many thanks, indeed.

* "Taking Things Seriously" made "The Must List" in the October 26 issue of Entertainment Weekly, where it rubs elbows with the likes of "The Abstinence Teacher," "Survivor: China," "Desperate Housewives" newbie Dana Delany, and the David Lee Roth/Van Halen reunion. Excerpt: "Proving one man's trash is another's treasure, this collection of photos and essays shows how the unlikeliest things can provide inspiration."

Click here to view the EW page. Then use the arrow key to scroll down to no. 9.

* Wow, Entertainment Weekly and Inside Higher Ed, two of my favorite periodicals, in the same week? It's too much. On October 24, IHE's "Intellectual Affairs" columnist Scott McLemee published a Q&A with yours truly about "Taking Things Seriously." Excerpt:

Q: My left shoe and the coffee table it is beneath are both undoubtedly objects, but neither has much of an aura of meaning or mystery. I value them. They are useful. Their absence would get my attention. But it probably wouldn't be possible to write an essay about either one that would belong in your gallery. So what’s the difference between any old object and "things," in your book?

A: I, too, value my left shoe and my coffee table! But I haven't invested them with mental or emotional energy, with complex ideas or strong feelings. Contrariwise, these particular possessions of mine aren't "notional," in the Victorian sense of the term: they don't demand my attention, they don't fascinate me.

It might be tempting to argue that such commonplace items a priori cannot be "objects with unexpected significance," to quote the book's subtitle. But to do so would be a mistake. (After all, Heidegger found Van Gogh's shoes endlessly evocative; and one of the significant objects in Taking Things Seriously is a coffee table of sorts rescued by Ingrid Schorr from a dead neighbor's apartment.)

My interest in someone's extraordinary object -- a grandfather's bayonet, a beloved pet's cremains, a GI Joe whose kung-fu grip still works -- is merely polite. What I find so charming about other people's totems, fetishes, fossils, and talismans is precisely this: Somehow, a perfectly ordinary object has taken on extraordinary significance. How? Why? I never get tired of hearing the answer.

PS: If you want to see me get raked over the coals by IHE readers who seem to know a lot more than I do about material culture studies and philosophy, read the comments appended to the IHE interview.

Posted by Joshua Glenn at 10:22 AM

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