Production of Space - Product vs Work

I think a "product" is a "work" which has been replicated. What Henri Lefebvre is saying is that a product is what comes from labour. It is something that can be manufactured again and again without any new information, without any originality or any individual gain. A work is a result of creation. It is a unique result of a process where the creator(s) give something to the item, construct a uniqueness or add something "more". A product is an object lacking in warmth and character. A work carries the beauty of its design, craft and creation. However we should remember that all "products", I think it’s fair to say, start with a "work". There is no iPod without the original prototype or even an original idea, in that case, can all works not be produced? In a way many "works" are seen as the end result of a creative process, of a journey for the creator. Michelangelo, for example, is the only one who could create the Pieta - yes there can be replicas made but they are only illusions/illustrations of the original. They are soulless. They are not the same as the original, as they are not a result of the original creative process. The progression and development of the idea are not the same.

Today we surround ourselves with products. We clam our individuality through clothes, technology and often ideas that are simply mass-produced products – Converse, iPod, Bush bad, Obama good. How does this work with the concept of exchange value vs use value? It can be presumed that we spend more on a product that gives us more use value – NO WE DON’T. An iPod has high use value, low exchange value. The Pieta has low use value, high exchange value. We pay for creativity, for uniqueness yet demand products. So the question is which could we live without - in reality; neither.

What I’m trying to get at, is that as human beings we need both products and works. Works provide tech. advances, it provides art, music, a passion for life and products take these studies/passions and spread them throughout the world, undoubtedly creating a call for further investment in tech/mechanical research etc.