I want to force myself to think about issues that can be easily avoided by choosing certain types of sites. So I excluded these that made me full of inspiration while hearing their names, including but not limited to:
- a museum
- a cemetery
- a lawn
- a street
- a garage
- a construction site
- a shelf selling mirrors
- Muji/Ikea
- an unnamed place …
Finally, I carefully picked out the most boring place in my opinion: the supermarket, especially the one next to my college.
Method 1: Visually-driven shopping
In this direction, I investigate and understand the supermarket by visually-driven shopping in it.
Method 2: Waitnotes
I’m looking forward to a new possibility by reading the shelves: this experiment takes a candy shelf in the supermarket as an example. I photographed the labels on all the packages on the shelf in the left picture to refer to this shelf.
Method 3: Describable
In this direction, I gave up any recording method other than myself for an immersive, complete experience. This is an approach that is not usually used to observe spaces like supermarkets, but it is not new to us, as it is often used in exhibitions, libraries or cinemas. During this process, I will be strict with myself: mute my phone, donít talk to others, donít look around, don’t think randomly, just concentrate on ìshopping in the supermarket.
I will attempt to maximise my understanding and remembering about the space and describe it to others by answering their questions.
In this dialogue, the audience will keep asking me questions. We use language to gradually carve out the original appearance of this space until a clear, concrete image is shaped.
This kind of communication is essentially no different from any other communication in the world: to get the full picture of the thing through a gradually approaching description, but never really arriving.
An example, this is a Q&A with me from a friend who has never been to this supermarket:
- Q: What kind of flooring does this supermarket have?
- A: It’s terrazzo.
- Q: How big is this supermarket? Is it open 24h?
- A: I guess it’s two-thirds the size of a football field.
- Q: Where are the snacks and drinks, closer to the entrance or the exit?
- A: The snack aisle is visible as soon as you enter the entrance, but drinks are a little further in, closer to the centre of the supermarket.
- Q: Do they have shelves for fresh fruit and vegetables? Will they have the kind of decorations made of wooden boards that look like orchard style?
- A: The former question, yes they do, it’s closer to the exit. The latter question, there is no such thing! Just use a regular frame.