Paal Bjelke Andersen, THE GREFSEN ADDRESS (2010)

“Probing the linguistics of imagined communities -– in this case the mediated rhetorical politics of the “nordic community” –- Andersen pits national languages against the larger territories they construct. The Grefsen Address samples the vocabulary of national conflict and contiguity ('border'; 'war'; 'language' et cetera) in the televised speeches of Nordic Presidents or Prime Ministers during the first decade of the 21st century. At the same time, he makes an analogous territorial catalogue of his own personal geography and its areas of inclusion and conflict, notating the civic streets and commercial entities crossed in his walks between his home and the Norwegian parliament. Between location and locution ('address', in both its senses), between the discretely local and the shared assemblage, the word and the action, Andersen traces the terms by which we describe and construct political space.” -– Craig Dworkin