Task 2 - Process or Product?
Marie writes:
In my exploration for the ‘Banal Nationalism’ task, I noticed my own inclination to think ahead towards a final outcome for my response. Should I create a photo-collage like ‘a postcard from Denmark’? What footage would most effectively represent a true response to the task? I realised I, by default, was looking ahead to the finishing line. My curiosity for the task was driven not only by the exploration I was doing when I was walking around Jespersvej noticing flags, I was equally concerned with ‘making the video response’. These reflections revealed my own assumptions of what makes a process. Was I truer to the project when I was exploring our neighbourhood by foot, running from house to house with a camera in my hand, than when I sat at my desk editing footage? This made me consider the relationship between the two: process and product. When did the exploration and ‘doing of the task' take place and when was I simply concerned with making a video response? When does a process end and a product begin?
For your task 2 I want you to consider the transition from process to product or perhaps more widely from beginning to end. Your task is to explore not the end points of process/product (or beginning/end) but the middle bit – the ‘in between’– where they meet. I want you to use your daily activities for this. This might be in your Danish lessons or in your yoga practice or in your commute to work. Questions to consider might be:
Does the transition from process to product have a (physical) location in you or outside of you, and if so where? Does it manifest itself in a particular bodily sensation? Can you find any indications in your approach to a task that suggests you are somewhere ‘in between’?
Your response may be a trace of your activities or thinking either through creative writing or mark-making. Bear in mind the relationship between product and process!