My Favourite Things: The Pathology of Collecting

I never really thought I was a collector.  I have collections of things, like shoes, scarves, belts, jewellery.  I like to keep a memento from trips that I take, so I collect key rings and fridge magnets from each place that I visit.  I suppose I collect books and magazines, as I never discard them, I keep them in a row on my desk.  However all these objects serve a purpose: I wear the shoes and accessories, I have the keepsakes to remember good times on holiday, and I read the books and mags that I have.  

However obsessive collecting is on a whole other level!  Sigmund Freud's theory on the reason why people collect highlights a controlling and dark side to a seemingly harmless hobby, a need for people to have an "object of desire" and linking this to a "collective unconscious" in us.

This video shows people who collect Barbie dolls.  They are obviously adults, so the purpose of collecting them is not to play with them, as you would have as a child, but to simply collect and display them.  

"Possession cannot apply to an implement, since the object I utilize always directs me back to the world.  Rather it applies to that object once it is divested of its function and made relative to a subject"

The System of Collecting

Jean Boudrillard

In other words what defines a collection is something that is not collected for use, but for its sheer being, to be categorised, displayed, owned for no purpose other than to possess it.  

The people in the video talk of having an emotional connection to the Barbie, telling childhood memories of good times had while playing with them, or of possessing a Barbie as having been a 'tabboo' issue for the male when he was younger, which he now feels he can be free of.  They also speak passionately of Barbie's fashion sense and style, personifying her and seeming to be in complete awe of her, almost as if they wish they themselves could become her...

"The singular object never impedes the process of narcissistic projection, which ranges over an indefinite number of objects: on the contrary, it encourages such multiplication, thus associating itself with a mechanism whereby the image of the self is extended to the very limits of the collection.  Here, indeed, lies the whole miracle of collecting.  For it is invariably oneself that one collects"

The System of Collecting

Jean Boudrillard

So it seems that what looks like a fairly simple concept of owning a collection of things, is actually a more in depth reflection of who we are or what we wish to become.