THE

Jaume BusomS

COLLECTION

by Jaume Busoms

What’s the point of a collection? 

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 This is a question I have asked myself countless times. And over time the answers have never been the same. In my case I started with the illusion, it was the illusion of evoking a past. I continued with the enthusiasm of carrying out a project. I cherished ambition until I understood that I was not the owner of anything, but a simple depository. And now, the only certainty that I have is that I am enjoying a collection that, in a few years, will surely be in other hands. Meanwhile, through the images, I share it. 

From my point of view, it’s not just about storage. Nor would I recommend aiming solely at financial gain. I would advise against just pursuing the “I have more than you.” But in all these expressions there is the term “only”, because hoarding, revaluing and a point of complacency are characteristics of collecting. 

An old piece, whatever it is, faded and lonely, is usually a nuisance. If you distinguish it by framing it, putting a base on it or hanging it on the wall, it becomes an object to which a cultural, experiential, decorative or any other value is attributed. When you gather three, linked to each other, it is already a collection. 

I started collecting old rackets, out of a deep sense of evocation. My goal was to get three rackets: a Slazenger Challenge #1, a Dunlop Maxply Fort, and a Wilson Jack Kramer Autograph. Because they reminded me of my teenage days, when I started playing tennis. As a middle-class kid, and as a mediocre bad tennis player, bad to be honest, I had little chance of having rackets of this level. For me these rackets were tennis luxury, the ultimate, the ultimate. For this reason, when, years ago, I found one of these three rackets in an antiques market, I couldn’t help but be tempted to buy it. Years later the same thing still happens to me. 

First through travel and then through the internet I was expanding the collection. I have self-imposed limits: never more than three hundred and until the 1980s. That is why the collection has been dynamic, with inputs and outputs, but always trying to maintain a meaning. The Excel sheet has been basic to keep all the rackets well organized. Year and country of manufacture. Frame and string features. Cost and place or way to get it. 

When you have a racket in your hands, think about how long it has existed. In the context in which it was created. In the beauty of its form. In the meaning and symbology of its decoration. The old racket is a sporting, recreational and, above all else, a cultural object.