HEARTBREAK CENTRAL

This unusual museum exhibits personal effects from failed relationships

- KESHIA AFRICA

BURN it, bin it or stuff it in the back of a cupboard what do you do with the mementoes of lost love when your heart's been broken? There's another option you could send it to the Museum of Broken Relationships, which exhibits the detritus of shattered relationships from around the world.

When Olinka Vištica and Dražen Grubišić, an artist and a film producer, broke up 20 years ago, they had stuff they couldn't decide who should get. There were things like Honey Bunny, a wind-up toy rabbit that accompanied them when they couldn't travel together. It posed and appeared in photos they sent each other while apart.

Deciding Honey Bunny's fate led to the creation of the museum in Zagreb, Croatia, says Olinka, "to show that this love existed".

Honey Bunny is in the museum, posed in front of a photo of a desert near Tehran, Iran.

Above it is a placard that says, "The bunny was supposed to travel the world but never got further than Iran".

"We transformed the concept of a museum from a temple about historic things, Olinka says.

"Museums can be about you and about me. We added some sort of democratic value and introduced love as a tool to learn about the world."