THE FOLLY POP-UP MUSEUM STORE

HAPPENINGText: Fann ZJ

“all department stores will become museums, and all museums will become department stores.” – Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol was a visionary. We all get our 15 minutes of fame. Which would explain the proliferation of everything pop-up. In the last month alone, pop-up diners, bars, stores and even markets have been dotting this tiny island.

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The folly pop-up museum store is not any pop-up store. Inspired by the museums of Europe (all 16 of them in a span of 6 weeks), it was a conceptual installation that brought paintings, graphics, craft and memory into one space, recreating the experience of place, the museum gift shop.

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The rolling hills of Salzberg were reinterpreted through the proliferation of dots. Entitled “Little Salzberg Dots,” landscapes and topographies were explored through the intensity and placement of dots across different mediums. Hand painted on stretched canvas, canvas tote bags, and Egyptian cotton shirts, the dots filled and “moved” through the gallery space.

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Collaborating with Italian design studio Kinky Muffin, the museum café was present through an installation of oversized pies, pastries and cupcakes, entirely handmade out of fabric. Intricate, colourful and full of personality, as fabulous as each cake looked, they doubled as a vanity case as well to store one’s trinkets. They looked too good to be eaten anyway.

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As in any museum gift shop, postcards were the order of the day. A series of portraits entitled “Jay Gone Missing” made its way back into the gallery space once again. Inspired by an NYC punk at Starbucks in SOHO, the works were previously shortlisted for the Sapporo Biennale Ideas Competition and the Gallery’s own 50×50 Squares Invasion painting competition. Only this time, they appeared as postcards and not artworks.

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Not forgetting the inspirations for the installation, the piece entitled “June + July 2012” documented the journey to the 16 museums in question, through a graphic designed poster. Ticket stubs, programmes, postcards purchased there as well as sketches were on showcase, depicted the moments of inspiration as one journeys through the spaces.

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It was these moments of inspiration that multi-disciplinary studio the folly store wanted to share. The highlight of any museum is the museum store, where you can take a piece of inspiration with you. In the spirit of a pop-up, the installation came to life for 2 days. Fingers crossed that it pops up soon enough to share those moments.

The folly pop-up museum store
Date: October 5th – 6th, 2013
Place: Instinc SOHO
Address: SOHO2 @ Central Singapore, 12 Eu Tong Sen Street #04-163, Singapore
Tel: +65 6227 9487
http://www.instinc.com

Text: Fann ZJ
Photos: the folly store

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