The Young Foundation, a non-profit, non-governmental think tank based in London that specialises in social innovation to tackle structural inequality, has launched a social media campaign to ask the public to share a photograph of an object that sums up 2020 for them. It could be anything from the chair you have sat in all year due to working from home, the cookbook you couldn’t have lived without when restaurants were shut, to a random online purchase that’s helped combat boredom – the more creative, the better, say the organisers.
A mock up of one idea…
Anyone can participate by sharing their image on social media, using the hashtag #Museumof2020 and explaining why that object sums up 2020 for them. The Young Foundation will collate these for a virtual exhibition in 2021 that explores our changing relationship with ‘stuff’ and how we come to understand our collective experiences through objects, rather than discussion.
“2020 has been a year of immense upheaval, loss and change for everyone and this has changed the things and objects we value,” says The Young Foundation’s CEO, Helen Goulden. “It has meant us needing and relying on things that we wouldn’t have imagined before Covid-19 came along. Masks are the most obvious example of this. But we know that there are thousands of other objects which have taken on a new meaning for people in 2020. Those objects will be different, because of people’s different and unequal experiences of the pandemic – and we’d love you to share yours!. What will you put in the Museum of 2020?”
To get involved, simply upload your photograph of the object that will always remind you of 2020 and share it on Twitter using the hashtag #Museumof2020.
