My ‘collector’ is not a real person, but instead exists in our minds as a twenty-first century version of the flâneur identified by the philosopher, Walter Benjamin (1892 –1940). Each of the works of art in the museum can be ‘read’ in many different ways, and In order to properly illuminate the complexities of the ideas encapsulated in each, we read Italo Calvino’s ‘Six Memos for the Next Millennium’ as the starting point for this speculation. The memos were intended to be the subjects of a series of lectures to be delivered at Harvard University in 1985, but were never delivered, due to the untimely death of the author.
They are:
1. Lightness
2. Quickness
3. Exactitude
4. Visibility
5. Multiplicity
A sixth, Consistency, was in the course of preparation at the time of Calvino’s death, but never finished. Having carefully read the memos, I considered what parts of the museum’s permanent collection could be represented
according to the first five definitions.
The Site
The House for a Collector of Ideas will be sited on the west side of the RISD Museum, between the boiler house and the existing museum walls. There is a large space that we will appropriate for our hypothetical proposition. No plans exist for it, so we are required to design an extension to the museum that provides the new accommodation. I Carefully studied the floor plans of each of the museum’s levels, and worked out a suitable way for the visitor to gain access to the House for a Collector of Ideas.
