Many history museums collect contemporary objects, stories, images and sounds. But reasoned collecting strategies and policies are often lacking. The sheer quantity of available material culture and the complexity of contemporary life leave many confused about how best to document and engage with the present. Collecting the Contemporaryaddresses one of the most fundamental issues facing today's history museums: why and how to engage with contemporary collecting? In a format which is approachable, attractive - and above all actionable, this handbook is packed with stimulating thinking and international case studies from some of the leading practitioners and thinkers in the field. This overview of contemporary collecting in a social historical context is well overdue. Original source material, ideas, developments and research have never before been brought together in a single volume.

While the importance of collections has been evident in the sciences and humanities for several centuries, the social and cultural significance of collecting practices is now receiving serious attention as well. As reflected in programs like Antiques Roadshow and American Pickers, and websites such as eBay, collecting has had a consistent and growing presence in popular culture. In tandem with popular collecting, institutions are responding to changes in the collecting environment, as library catalogs go online and museums use new technologies to help generate attendance for their exhibits. In Contemporary Collecting: Objects, Practices, and the Fate of Things, Kevin M. Moist and David Banash have assembled several essays that examine collecting practices on both a personal and professional level. These essays situate collectors and collections in a contemporary context and also show how our changing world finds new meaning in the legacy of older collections. Arranged by such themes as “Collecting in a Virtual World,” “Changing Relationships with Things,” “Collecting and Identity—Personal and Political,” and “Collecting Practices and Cultural Hierarchies,” these essays help illuminate the role of objects in our lives. Covering a breadth of interdisciplinary perspectives and subjects—from PEZ candy dispensers and trading cards to sports memorabilia and music—Contemporary Collecting will be of interest to scholars of cultural studies, anthropology, popular culture studies, sociology, art history, and more.

This is a revised colour edition of this acclaimed book, which deals with the problems of collecting contemporary objects in museums and aims to answer some of the awkward questions raised. What should we collect? Who should decide? How can we adequately record how we live our lives today? What about the storage implications? What limits should we place on ourselves? What processes and directives can ensure best practice? "Owain Rhys reminds us that contemporary collecting is the first and most significant act of interpretation and a primary responsibility of almost every museum." - David Anderson, Director General, National Museum Wales. "The contemporary moment is the moment in which to collect, effectively. But overwhelmed by diverse recording media, unsure of an appropriate collecting philosophy or fieldwork practice, and facing up to globalisation and mass production, most museums have recorded that moment as a silence. Owain Rhys gives timely reflection on the development of contemporary collecting practice, and considers how museums might face up to the challenge." - Professor Simon Knell, School of Museum Studies, University of Leicester.

Whether you're an art fan, aficionado, or collector, this book should be on your required reading list. Like a textbook for a class given by all of the world's leading experts, 'Collecting Contemporary Art' will teach you everything you ever wanted to know about the contemporary art market.

Published in conjunction with the exhibition "Selections from the Donna and Howard Stone collection," held at the Art Insitute of Chicago from June 25 to September 19, 2010.

Twelve distinguished curators discuss the questions & challenges faced by museums in acquiring & preserving contemporary art.

Ethics of Contemporary Collecting addresses pressing and pertinent issues around ethical contemporary collecting, reflecting on how practices are evolving or in flux. Across three sections, each containing live sector subjects from the climate crisis to digital collecting to centring communities, this book collates a combination of case studies and in-depth chapters by leading practitioners working in the field. These pieces are instructive and provide practical, transferable examples of how people have approached these challenges. It highlights examples of leading practice in the field and illustrates ethical approaches to contemporary collecting as work in this area progresses and our conversations about it advance. To reflect this ongoing growth, the book closes with an ‘Activations’ section of discussion prompts intended to keep the conversations and progress – on individual, institutional and societal levels – going. Ethics of Contemporary Collecting is an indispensable tool for informing, training and educating the next generation of curators and collection professionals, and inspiring future collecting projects.