A collector’s family history centers on early American furniture, art, and decorative objects that now support museum lending and education through a foundation. A contemporary collector describes collecting as cultivating taste and worldview, learning through curiosity, and enjoying the thrill of winning deals. Collectors also face the question of why rare, precious items are pursued at high cost. A framework of motivations includes a bad driver rooted in mimetic warfare, where identity is sought through rivalry. After basic needs are met, desire can become competitive, leading people to acquire rivalrous totems that communicate discerning taste or absolute status.
"Collecting, he says, is about "cultivating a taste and aesthetic and kind of a worldview," but also "an excuse to learn more and to follow my curiosity." There is pleasure, too, in the chase: "If you feel like you've gotten one over on the market, it's really exciting," he admits."
"Why do we collect things that are rare and precious, then? What motivates collectors to spend thousands, or millions, shaping troves of inanimate and sometimes bizarre objects across a lifetime? Is this an articulation of self, a bid for status, a form of custodianship, or simply a sophisticated way of keeping score?"
"According to author Luke Burgis, whose forthcoming book The One and the Ninety-Nine explores what it means to shape a stable identity in today's fractured and noisy world, the need to collect has multiple drivers: "One bad, one neutral, and one good.""
""The bad motivation is mimetic warfare, driven by the need to acquire a certain sense of identity," Burgis explains. "Once basic needs are met, desire doesn't disappear; it just gets weirder. We start competing for rivalrous totems - objects that signal discerning taste or absolute status.""
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