Isn´t the editing process a perfect metaphor to understand memory? From an uncontainable mass of footage, we select the moments that are relevant to us, we put them together creating chains of association, we inscribe a cause-and-effect logic between completely unrelated events and, in the end, we produce a whole narrative from spare pieces of time. In a way we are all editors when we think about our past and when we form our sense of self. We forget the routines and the mundane; it is all erased from memory to keep a clear trace of the pivotal moments in our lives.
Through a series of methods and techniques, I created an audio-visual archive that tried to materialize a series of memories. Now it was time to assemble a whole narrative out of these moments. There was never a storyline that could give coherence to the whole, I never used a script and, as a memory, there was no clear beginning or end. How to form a continuum out of this seemingly random stream of images?
If editing is a good metaphor for memory, could we make editing not only a metaphor but an actual functioning process that works like memory? What would happen if I start cutting and pasting my material without any idea of where it would lead me, working only through a process of associations?
There was never an official hierarchy in my images: I shot the process behind the making with the same artistic intention as the actual reenactments. My footage consists of images and sounds that come from the scouting trips, from the drawing sessions, from conversations with advisers, from reenactments, from moments of improvisation, from casting sessions; in short, from every possible realm, and they were all shot with the same quality standards. I never created an index where I could locate my footage and there was never a pre-defined hierarchy in my shots.
I shot this film like we live life: I went through a series of diverse and completely unpredictable experiences that had no predefined relationship between one another. Since there was such a heavy emphasis on experimentation it was a big leap into the unknown for me, having no idea if the final rendered product would be interesting or “good” at all. In such a way, the filmed material was a documentation of a series of life experiences of a period where I tried to remember through film. So after taking some time off, I thought that I could approach my footage as memory approaches life.
To edit this film, I proposed the following method: to edit without any pre-defined storyline, cutting and pasting the scenes based on the immediate thought associations that arise from the experience of watching the footage. In a way, this formal procedure for editing will render a film that works as a stream of memories. It can be said that the process of editing will be a memory of the process of remembering.
