families histories time childhood affection
There was once an archive housed in the basement of post-WWII, Levittown-inspired, pitched roof house in the Toronto suburb of Mississauga. The street was Cortland Crescent in Applewood Acres, so named in honour of the apple orchards that were razed to build the neighbourhood. Now I draw your attention from the exterior design of the street space where everything looked the same, choreographed to keep kids playing in view of their parents, to the basement where no one but an invited guest was meant to look and I doubt that ever happened. Guests belonged upstairs. This subterranean space was for family, a museum curated by my grandparents as a monument of who they believed we collectively were and their hopes of what we would become. In this place, we would watch my grandfather’s movies. Cool, damp and dimly lit, the habitable portion of the basement was a ‘finished’ box of acoustic tile on a dropped ceiling, speckled black and white linoleum squares, and faux wood paneling. While the rest of the basement was ‘for storage’, this room, too, stored objects in the spirit of utilitarian reverence, housing treasures from Gramps and Jeannie’s family homes, from the family they made together, and the travels they had together once their family had grown. A leather rocker and a large circular mission- style coffee table came from my grandfather’s side of the family. On the table, scented hotel soaps and restaurant matchbooks, trophies from my grandparents’ travels filled the basket and the lacquered ballerina box that my sister and I dumped and sorted and sniffed through. If my sister and I answered a geography
film archives | in the basement by jen vandenburgh
movies home
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On Site review 20: archives and museums
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