Goodbye, "time to to plant flowers"

I peek outside our overflowing apartment and eyeball the delivery men bearing a truckload of cling-wrapped, mid-century modern chairs, dressers and lamps. "I can't believe you bought so much, where are we going to put all of it?!" My husband brushes aside my shrieking like he would a fly, and throws the door open to his latest acquisitions. Welcome to life with a collector. The scene repeats itself with dazzling frequency - if the delivery men are not bearing design-conscious furniture, then it is contemporary paintings. Sometimes it is my husband himself outside the door, heaving a box of newly purchased vintage vinyl records. Every wall and nearly every sq m ... is packed with testaments to my husband's love of good design and art.  He is also an audiophile - think gizmos from a second-hand Rega turntable to huge honking Vandersteen speakers - and his books, CDs and LPs number several thousand, nestled on shelves and racks or stacked in vertical piles that rise dangerously towards the ceiling. The house also contains miscellany such as back copies of one-time style bible Wallpaper, including its first issue in 1996, and two antique typewriters that previously belonged to my father-in-law. Did I mention that we also have two young kids? ... So far, the only accident has been one broken faux Louis Poulsen table lamp - the originals are placed well out of reach of mischievous little hands. On the upside, my daughter must be the only four-year-old to know the word "typewriter". For my husband, collecting is not about deep pockets ... but seeing the value in what others might miss. His heroes are not the Charles Saatchis of this world, but Herbert and Dorothy Vogel, the postal clerk and librarian who amassed a staggering 5,000 pieces of modern art in a one-bedroom New York apartment, then donated all of it to museums and galleries in the United States. Sure, I take pride in my husband and his various collections, assembled through many hours of research and bonding with equally passionate dealers. The mid-century furniture, for example, tells the story of the streamlined aesthetic, new materials and themes ranging from molecular chemistry to science fiction that gripped post World War II utopian imaginations. But I also have this nagging worry that we are living in one of those scary hoarder homes. The above is an extract from Clarissa Oon's article in The Straits Times. I reproduced it here because it might as well have been written by D, who has often accused me of being a hoarder. I can't help it. I fall passionately into things and when I like one, I like more and I want to collect them all. Be it music, books, cars (big ones and miniature models), art (painted, sculpted, printed), cameras, watches, hifi equipment.  At the same time this article appeared, I did something remarkable. I sold my first piece of art (admittedly in exchange for a bigger better piece). Anna Berezovskaya, whose work addresses many of life's most important questions and quandaries in an exuberant and probing manner (according to Ian Findlay Brown the founder of Asian Art News) first caught my eye 2 years ago, courtesy of Chris Churcher of Red Sea Gallery. Her works speak to me in a way no other art has done. It is layered in a complex manner yet her message is often a simple one. Like freedom, like love, like dreaming.  As the first significant part of my collection I have decided to part ways with, I thought I'd pay it homage by honoring it with its own image in this blog. Goodbye, "time to plant flowers" It's also proof that I am a collector, not a hoarder :-)