Making a common resource pool of surplus material

Redistributing private, surplus material into a shared, regenerated resource that is not contingent on financial ability.

Information
This Recipe for

Redistributing private, surplus material into a shared, regenerated resource that is not contingent on financial ability.

Recipe source

This recipe is derived from The Library of Unread Books and composed by the Commons • Art team. The Library of Unread Books asks questions about ownership and the relationship between wealth and knowledge. It brings to light once-hidden-away titles to emphasize shared knowledge, and functions as a common resource pool of knowledge that is not contingent on financial means. It also brings together a network of worldwide, lifetime members of this library.

Background, situation & credit

The Library of Unread Books was developed in September 2016 by artist Heman Chong and producer and librarian Renee Staal in the context of a residency at NTU Center for Contemporary Art in Singapore, where it remained until May 2017. The Library then travelled to the Museum of Contemporary Art and Design in Manila (August-November 2017) and landed at Casco Art Institute: Working for the Commons in November 2017. It has also been presented at Jameel Arts Centre in Dubai (November 2019-January 2020).

Ingredients

Surplus resource, a gathering and collection space, custodians. Optional: membership cards.

Instruction

Step 1

Identify a surplus resource in your community that may be of use when shared with or redistributed to others. Think for example about different materials, objects, but also immaterial things such as knowledge and skills.

Step 2

As a group decide on how you will gather this surplus resource, where it will be gathered and who will be its temporary custodians. Decide also on whether you want to open up the collection beyond your group or community and how that might impact your decisions

Step 3

Consider how you intend to redistribute the resources: will they stay inside the space for people to use? Can people become a member of your common resource pool? Will people be allowed to take the resources they need?

Step 4

In the space, find a way to visualise - either by bringing the objects or something that represents them - the surplus resources that you have. Allow people to browse through them, categorize them and make them their own. It is important to consider different ways in which a resource can be regenerated, this does not need to be through redistribution but can also happen inside the space.

Step 5

Depending on your decisions, offer a membership card, or support in letting people decide which resources they may want and need to take with them.

Step 6

Throughout this experiment discuss questions of ownership: what does it mean to own something you don’t use? How is finance and ownership related when it comes to the resource you are sharing? What does a lack of access to this resource do to people? And what does an excess of this resource do to others?

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Step 10

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The Library gathers books that were once private property and have been donated by an individual who did not read the book whilst it was in their possession. The Library brings these books together to emphasise shared knowledge, and make them accessible through a visit at the library site as a way to ‘common’ them.
Quote from a Library member/user