The Work Behind It

I personally don’t believe there’s such thing as “passive consumption,” where you sit and read a book or watch a TV show and not engage with it critically. I think the art we come in contact with lingers and affects our minds and behaviours in at least small, subtle ways. But it has an even larger impact when we consider the work and decisions that go into it.

Our role as consumers is to contemplate what we take in and give it the opportunity to move us. That YouTube video you watched the other day, for example: have you considered the creator’s efforts and all the resources needed to make that happen? Have you thought about the decisions they needed to make in order to present the video in that specific way?

While I believe that anything we consume affects us in some small way, we can open ourselves to new and exciting understandings when we factor in the efforts of the creator.

At this moment when we’re spending a lot more time than usual with the work of artists, let’s think about the labour behind the scenes.