The Museum of Broken Relationships
In Maibar, Slovenia, a woman found a small glass horse along with her wedding ring in a cashbox hidden in the depths of her closet. This woman is now divorced, the glass horse a memento from her now broken marriage. “His love disappeared like the wind. I put the glass horse into the box beside the wedding ring and shut it. I say to myself: don’t cry! Tomorrow is a new day.”
In Berlin, Germany, a man scorned used a small axe to chop up the furniture of his lost love. “The axe was promoted to a therapy instrument.”
These stories and many more are those of lost love, broken hearts and ruptured romances. While melancholic, these moments are but an inherent part of everyone’s life. We all have such stories, and we all have with us, albeit hidden and possibly forgotten, items attached to certain memories. They are more than just markers of despondency – they are memories, once tokens of love, and life lessons.
The Museum of Broken Relationships in Zagreb, Croatia pays homage to these objects and memories, exhibiting items and stories donated by the general public.
Established by former couple Olinka Vištica and Dražen Grubišić, the museum sought to answer the questions of what exactly do we do with all these things that are collected during our relationships. We could throw them away, but exhibiting them has a kind of voyeuristic therapy for others, and a kind of cleansing for the ex-owner.
In Los Angeles you will find another Museum of Broken Relationships, and you can find exhibitions opening around Europe, Asia, and America. Past exhibitions have displayed objects from broken pocket watches (“I thought she liked things that were old and broken … But it turned out she didn’t.”) chipped gnomes (“…At that moment it flew over to the windscreen of the new car, rebounded and landed on the asphalt surface”), fluffy handcuffs, old bras, old Wi-Fi routers, and other personal paraphernalia.
The current exhibition in Zagreb is titled What we left behind? centering on memories that the world’s refugees are forced to leave behind when fleeing their homes. Organised by the Red Cross and United Refugee Agency, the 13 exhibitions share the stories of refugees from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan and Somalia who are currently residing in Croatia.
Only two of the exhibitions contain permanent donations, while the rest of the items will be safely returned to their respective owners.
The Museum of Broken Relationships shares the items of our lives. Some objects may seem mundane to others, but in fact these objects carry a sentimental value, the feeling of which owning one of these items, everyone can understand.
What we left behind? is on until Wednesday 31 August 2016 at the Museum of Broken Relationships, Ćirilometodska 2,10 000 Zagreb, Croatia.
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