AWMS x MADSEN SYLVESTER STUDIO EDITIONS 'THE MUSEUM CAP'

“This Museum is a fictitious museum…”
- Marcel Broodthaers

Marcel Broodthaers (1924-1976) was a Belgian conceptual artist who in 
1963, after two decades as a (by his own admission) struggling poet,
 began creating objects and assemblages as his main artistic outlet. His
 first piece, Pense-Bête, consisted of fifty volumes of his unsold poetry
 symbolically encased in plaster and displayed in a gallery. 

In 1968, he began undertaking his most complex work to date. Inspired
 by the Paris Uprising, he set about creating an ‘artificial’ museum, Musée d’art Moderne, Département des Aigles (Museum of Modern Art, Department of Eagles) initially staged at his home in Brussels. Broodthaers expanded the work over the following four years to include multi-site installations of hundreds of objects that used humour, language and performance to question the legitimising function 
and power of the institution and “museum-quality” art.

MADSEN SYLVESTER STUDIO finds a kinship in Broodthaers’ critique 
of what a museum is and how the institution decides which objects are
 selected, elevated and deemed worthy of veneration. The Studio posits 
that a shop window in a small coastal town in Kent can be the site of 
paradigm-shifting exhibitions.

In a landscape that increasingly devalues creativity without commercial 
return, the Studio invites proposals for exhibitions and micro-events from 
artists, curators, makers, and researchers at any point in their practice. 
The studio offers a free space for thinking through and experimenting 
with fashion projects at any stage from early concepts to fully developed 
works.

With Musée d’art Moderne, Broodthaers was not only an artist but now a
 museum director, curator, financier, administrator and press agent. In
 1970, he also became a “designer” when he created the work 
‘Casquette Museum’. Crudely painting the word ‘MUSEUM’ onto the 
front panels of a simple cotton baseball cap, this was Broodthaers’ first
 garment, and it was not for sale. The cap was yet another creation
asking questions of value and authority in the art world.

Inspired by Broodthaers' blithe approach to institutional critique, THE 
MUSEUM CAP is the second MADSEN SYLVESTER STUDIO edition. A
 cotton baseball cap in a washed black and ecru colour way with Broodthaers' own bold script embroidered on the front. 

Available to order now, shipping the week of 16th March 2026.

MADSEN SYLVESTER STUDIO EDITIONS were created to support the 
work of the Studio and to keep the space free of charge to our 
contributors.

- 100% cotton baseball cap with adjustable back strap and brass fittings
 
- One Size Fits All

- Embroidered in England