原文发表于艺术新闻中文版 Published on the Art Newspaper China：http://www.tanchinese.com/archives/museum/31703
奥克兰。如果资本主义的末日已经来临，我们是否应该建立一间博物馆来反思它的过去并保存它的历史？今年夏天，策展人 Timothy Furstnau 和安德里娅·史蒂夫斯（Andrea Steves）在加利福尼亚州的奥克兰市（Oakland）实现了这个想法。
Oakland, California. If the end of Capitalism has arrived, should we establish a museum to preserve its history and reflect on its past? This summer, curator Timothy Furstnau and Andrea Steves realized this concept in the city of Oakland, California.
▲ “资本主义博物馆”展览现场，图片来源：Museum of Capitalism
一走进资本主义博物馆，你便可以转动一个装满一美分机器的曲柄，它一小时内吐出来的硬币总价正好是博物馆所在城市的每小时最低工资。机器旁的玻璃柜里则展示着一组超市购物包，虽然它们并不是电影《美国丽人》（American Beauty）里那种可以随风飘动的塑料袋，但是这些用动物皮革缝制的超市商标的袋子也在用静止的姿态强调它们属于资本主义产物的本质。作品标签更是以过去式的口吻介绍了塑料袋和皮革袋的使用历史，仿佛它们对人类生活、环境所造成的杀伤力已成为过去。
Once walking into the Museum of Capitalism, you can play with a machine that is filled with pennies. Just rotate the rod for an hour - the value of the coins come out of the machine will equal to the minimum wage of the city that you are at. Next to the machine is a display box of shopping bags. Although they are not the kind of plastic bags that float in the air in the movie American Beauty, these leather-made bags with logos of big chain supermarkets statically assert their nature as capitalist products. Its wall label even uses past tense to introduce the history of plastic and leather grocery bags, as if their damages on environment and human life are stories of the past.
▲ Jordan Bennett 作品《Artifact Bags》，2013-2015年，图片来源：Museum of Capitalis
跳出我们身处的资本主义环境、以一个来自未来的角度回头审视它，并通过艺术使我们对资本主义的认识产生新的距离——这本身就是博物馆的设计初衷。创办人 Timothy Furstnau 在接受《艺术新闻／中文版》采访时说道，2010年当他听到英国政治理论家阿列克斯·卡利尼科斯（Alex Callinicos）畅想未来的资本主义博物馆时——就像南非有种族隔离博物馆，布拉格有共产主义博物馆——他便在第一时间注册了 museumofcapitalism.org（现为博物馆官方网站）。在完成一系列的调研后，这个策展双人组成功获得了一笔来自 Emily Hall Tremaine 基金会共21.5万美元的项目资助金。这笔资金不仅帮助策展人租下了奥克兰市一间近1千平米的场地以承接为期2个月的线下展览，还以租借或是委约的形式将60余位艺术家的80余件作品进行展出，探讨了如平权、国际贸易、监禁、生态问题等次主题。
Jumping out of the capitalist context we are in right now, looking back with a futuristic perspective, and using art to increase new distance between Capitalism and us - this is the original intention of opening this "museum". During his interview with TANC, founder and curator Timothy Furstnau recalled in 2010 when he heard the British political theorist Alex Callinicos talking about museums of Capitalism in the future - like the Apartheid Museum in South Africa and the Museum of Communism in Prague - he registered museumofcapitalism.org immediately. After finishing initial research, this curatorial duo received a grant of $215,000 from the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation. This grant helped the collective rent an exhibition space in Oakland to host this 2-month long exhibition of 80 artworks lent by over 60 artists.
▲ “资本主义博物馆”展览现场，图片来源：Museum of Capitalism
策展人在采访中特别介绍了艺术家莎伦·丹尼尔（Sharon Daniel）的视频作品：在一段访问中，一位正在手工缝制美国国旗的黑人女性囚犯告诉镜头前的观众，她每小时只能获得65美分的补贴，而这与美国社会所信奉的爱、平等、骄傲等信条毫不相符。
During the interview, the curator highlighted Sharon Daniel's video work: an African American female prisoner complaines about her job of sewing flags of the United States. "I only get paid for 65 cents for an hour." Is this the so-called love, equality, and pride that American society truly believes in?
▲ Sharon Daniel《Undoing Time | Pledge》，2013年，图片来源：Hyperallergic
让艺术作品与观众产生的有效互动也是资本主义博物馆所重视的成果。你可以站上香港艺术家周颖璇 （Christy Chow）设计的跑步机：你跑得越快，视频装置里的女工就会以更高的效率制作一件衣服；而脚步上的丝毫懈怠也会随时导致这件衣服的无法完工。“资本主义洗手间”也十分值得体验。在这里，你会对公共卫生、隐私、监视、无性别厕所等议题的历史产生新的了解。
It is also the curator's intention to encourage the audience to interact with artworks. You can step on a running machine designed by Hong Kong-based artist Christy Chow. The faster you run, the faster the women worker can produce a piece of clothing; but if slowing down your steps, you will fail the mission in seconds. The Capitalist Bathroom Experience also worths trying - here, you will read about the history of public health, privacy, surveillance, and unisex restrooms.
素人艺术在博物馆里也占着极大比重。生活在洛杉矶的医生卡伦（Caren）在职业生涯中收集了1千多支印着各种医疗产品的签字笔，而每一支都是不同公司的医药代表送给他的“小礼物”。由于几年前的一个法令叫停了这种行为，卡伦的收藏也变成了这段礼物史的缩影。
Works created by non-artists are also presented in the museum. Dr. Caren shows off a small part of his massive collection of signature pens. These are all gifts to him from pharmaceutical sales representatives throughout his early career. Due to a recent act, the doctor no longer received new gifts, and this collection became the real marks in this history of pen gifting.
资本主义博物馆的礼品商店也同样是一件艺术作品。艺术家 Evan Desmond Yee 将博物馆的一段长空间一分为二，做成了一个镜像环境：一边是一家典型的21世纪博物馆礼品店，且在实际运营；而另一边虽然沿用了对面礼品店的室内设计，而商品架上却空无一物。策展人希望访者可以通过这个“空房间”认识到自己对商品的欲望。
The pop-up shop inside the Museum of Capitalism is crafted as an artwork as well. Artist Even Desmond Yee evenly divided a space into two, mirroring each other: one side is decorated as a typical 21st century museum store, while the other only displaces the same shelves but with no products. The artist seems to invite his visitors to investigate their desire of commodity through this empty room.
▲ Evan Desmond Yee《The Gift Shop/Shop of Desires》，2017年，图片来源：Museum of Capitalism
8月20日，“资本主义博物馆”首展即将闭幕。策展人指着这组架空在一堆土壤上方的泥塑头像，介绍了化学家小托马斯·米基利（Thomas Midgley Jr.），而正是他在上世纪美国经济繁荣的“咆哮20年代”期间发现了对环境有巨大破坏作用的四乙基铅和氟利昂。为了纪念这位化学家，艺术小组 CoClimate 将可用于净化污染环境的植物种子放置于这些特制的雕塑里，并在闭幕当日任由访者敲碎，以预示种子们即将开始任重而道远的污染治理之路。
The inaugural exhibition of Museum of Capitalism is closing on August 20th. The curator told me that the artist collective CoClimate will host a closing ceremony on the same day. He pointed at a group of small clay busts hanging over a pile of soil, which are filled with biodegradable plants seeds. These clay sculptures will be cracked, releasing the seeds to the journey of making our natural environment a little better.
▲ CoClimate《Bust of the Worst》，2007年，图片来源：Museum of Capitalism
而谈到“博物馆”下一步的计划，策展人提到了即将开始预售的展览画册和展评文献集。书里包括了艺术评论家露西·利帕德（Lucy Lippard）和政治哲学家尚塔尔·墨菲（Chantal Mouffe）等学者为这个项目撰写的文章。策展人还表达了与 Emily Hall Tremaine 基金会进一步合作、将展览巡回美国更多城市的期待。“比起长期租赁同一场地、运营一家实体博物馆并建立馆藏，我们更加享受与艺术家共同合作项目的过程。”
Talking about the next step of the museum, the curator mentioned the upcoming exhibition catalogue, which includes articles contributed by art critic Lucy Lippard and political philosopher Chantal Mouffe. The Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation will keep supporting this curatorial project and bring it to more cities in the United States. "Rather than running a permanent space and building up a collection, we are more interested in and more passionate about the process of collaborating with artists all over the world."
▲ Blake Fall-Conroy《Police Flags》，2009年，图片来源：Museum of Capitalism
在“博物馆”的正门旁，以红白蓝三色警灯模拟美国国旗样式的装置正透过大落地窗闪烁着它的光芒，吸引着每个到访者的眼球。同时，对于刚刚离开展馆的人来说，这样的装置也像是在警示着什么：我们并不应该认为这里陈列的“历史”是理所当然，否则这一趟“资本主义博物馆”的参观与完成一次文化猎奇活动就并无二致了。毕竟，迈出了“博物馆”的大门，我们又重新踏回了资本主义的世界。而这一次，我们需要带着新的思考上路。
Next to the exit of Museum of Capitalism, an installation of police beacon lights attracted my attention, as if it is delivering concerning messages to museum visitors. At last, once we step out of the Museum of Capitalism, we enter into the real world of Capitalism. But this time, we should take our new thinking with us.
撰文、采访 / 李安琪 Writer, Interviewer / Anqi Li
原文发表于艺术新闻中文版 Published on the Art Newspaper China：http://www.tanchinese.com/museum/31703/