Where I Was From

Book Report: Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder

This one goes out to my friends in Los Angeles, as well as those of you who've happily accompanied me to confusing places like the House on the Rock, The Mutter Museum, and the Barbie Museum.

The Museum of Jurassic Technology in West L.A. is exactly the project you'd expect Jorge Luis Borges to create if he got tired of writing and moved on to visuals. An exhibit on nineteenth century theories about memory leads into a hall of folk remedies and superstitions (mouse pie will cure stammering), a collection of tiny mosaics made from butterfly scales, sculptures that fit inside needle eyes, and so on. Bats that can fly through lead are represented. There's an exhibit on American trailer parks that resembles a study of ancient cultures like you'd see at a natural history museum. Climb the stairs to view a gallery of Russian astronaut dog portraits, wander into a tearoom full of women chattering in a foreign language (something East European?), excuse yourself, and head back down the stairs to attempt to sort your brain out.

I'd been wondering what the hell the place was supposed to mean for about a year and a half after visiting until someone mentioned Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder offhand and I immediately bought the book. Lawrence Weschler writes for Harper's (where some of the book originally appeared in essay form) and The New Yorker, and bothered to do some research after the museum left him equally bewildered. What came out of his research is a short and amusing history of museums in their original form, which was equal parts private collection (the art/science/natural history exhibits that we know and love as separate museums nowadays) and display of dubious curiosities (wonders from the mysterious east, including many, many human horns). The Museum of Jurassic Technology is a throwback to those sixteenth century "Wunderkammers" or wonder cabinets, and it's surprising to learn what's "real" and what's not in the museum - as well as what kind of person it takes to run such a place.


Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder: Pronged Ants, Horned Humans, Mice on Toast, and Other Marvels of Jurassic Technology
by Lawrence Weschler
Vintage Books, 1996, 168 pages
Buy it here.

Labels: California, entertainment, travel

posted by Leah @ 12:36 PM