ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT
ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT
ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT
ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT
ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT
ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT
ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT
ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT
ALL WRITING IS SELF-INDULGENT

All writing is self-indulgent— the written word, just like the sonic and visual forms of documentation, allows the artist and writer to express their personal observations of the outer world. However, filtered through the lens of their own experiences, art is almost always irrevocably subjective to the perspective of the author. Even great writers and artists rarely manage to separate themselves from their creative outputs, which can create a sense of self-importance in artistic pieces. 
This project does not attempt to deny this vanity—no, writing (and nearly all art) indulges, and sometimes validates, the artist’s personal observations of their inner and outer worlds. That is, after all, why art can affect us, and be moving, funny, or interesting. This piece does not refute the self-indulgence of making art; rather, it was an interrogation of what would happen if creative attention was focused purely on observing and recording (ie. ‘collecting’) other people, every day, for 28 days. 
The collections took place over the same time period, but were geographically removed from one another. A corollary of the project was that the observations of the collected subjects, though worlds apart in space, were essentially the same in their fundamental humanness. Soften your eyes, soften your hearts. Maybe all writing is not just self-indulgent after all. 

Collecting people - full track

noa amson