ART

TIME UNFOLDING

or dance with art and light

By Eason Jiang 

Once upon a time. It’s a phrase that we hear our whole lives. It is the witness and recorder of time, the moment we go from listeners to speakers; it is the trigger of the time machine to activate our brains, bringing us back to the unknown period when the story begins. The “time” comes to our ears, like a rewinding tape, like a rolling vinyl record. We hear it, just like the question, can a fish see the water that surrounds it? To us who are wrapped in time, is this concept visible or touchable? Fortunately, we are not fish. We, to some extent, are good at creating objects to which time can attach itself.

Time hastens its way. We stand still

The first oil painting to show the passage of time is often attributed to The Tribute Money (1425) by Masaccio. The content of the picture is roughly divided into three scenes on the left, middle, and right, which describe Jesus Christ and the tax collector not just in three different ways, but, most importantly, in three different moments in time. In the middle part, the tax collector asks Christ for the tribute for the temple, and Christ orders Peter to take a coin from the mouth of the first fish he can catch; on the left, Peter squats on the shore and takes the coin from the mouth of the fish; on the right, Peter hands the coin to the tax collector. These three stages are combined, and we see these three different moments expressed in spatial scale.

Masaccio catches three moments of time in one still picture

Artists hardly express time in a single scene. In early works, they prefer to express the passage of time through the change of scenes and the change of background features. In other words, they are not expressing the dimension of time, but the development of the story itself. Starting with Masaccio's work, the expression of time does not become a separate dimension integrated into scenes, but is expressed through other pictorial factors.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, with the development of photography, people had a completely new way of understanding and observing the world. Artists were able to capture changes that were invisible to the naked eye and began to be able to decompose various continuous movements and introduce them into the picture, creating dynamic expressions and even further making time visible and concrete. Marcel Duchamp was one of the best of them.

Sad Young Man on a Train

Before talking about Duchamp’s famous painting Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2, I would like to discuss another Duchamp, Sad Young Man on a Train. This painting was created sometime between 1911 and 1912. Duchamp called it a study of Nude. According to Duchamp, the man in the picture is himself.

Can you see how sad the young man is?

In the center of the picture is a standing man, whose shape and outline are represented by overlapping geometric figures, which is a typical Cubist style. From the left to the center of the picture, the figure changes from blurry to clear, from general to precise, and the color changes from light to dark. The geometric figure gradually breaks away from the background, from shaking to stable, until we finally see a clear outline. From the middle of the canvas to the right, the process reverses itself. In addition, the man in the picture has some distortion and stretching near the head on the left, linking it to the virtual shadow on the left; while on the right is the repetition of the man's outline, and in terms of spatial dimension, it is extending "forward."

In this painting, the two states of motion of the man are integrated into one scene, one moment. The shadow on the left represents the man's swaying on the train, while the repeated outline on the right represents the man's continuous "forward" movement with the train. Unlike many previous paintings, this painting expresses a magical real-time dynamic. Duchamp placed the static figure in the center of the picture, so that the swaying and forward movement, separated by the two sides of the painting, can be reunited in a way that "both dynamics are extensions of this static state.” The focus of this painting is undoubtedly on man’s movements, but the actual traces of time are quite slight.

Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 (Nu descendant un escalier n° 2)

The Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2（1912) is completely different and still a typical Cubist painting. At first glance, the painting does not have a specific focus. Although the "woman" on the far right has the clearest outline and lines, her characteristics are relatively weakened because there is no obvious change in the depth of the color of other "women" in the painting. This also creates another effect, which makes it seem that, “all women are the focus."

This is real Duchamp masterpiece of time

Unlike Sad Young Man on a Train, Duchamp only focuses on one movement, the action of "going down the stairs." Furthermore, he introduces a clear and narrower spatial range, which is the stairs. By doing so, the action is emphasized in an extreme manner. On the other hand, compared with the "afterimage" on the left side of the study, this painting is more similar to the right part, which means this painting tends to express the dynamics of the bodies in space. Duchamp, in favor of depicting multiple sequential phases of motion within a single frame, renders the figure as a series of overlapping, fragmented forms, creating a sense of fluidity and continuous movement. In this way, moments in time, represented by all the images of the woman, are equally depicted and presented. So, to be more precise, the woman is present and in focus in all time periods in the painting. What an achievement.

Thus, in this painting, the dimension of time is accurately presented through Duchamp’s dynamic use of segmentation. As people's eyes move, the woman begins to move, descending from a high point on the right of the canvas to a low point on the left. In my opinion, this is the clearest representation of time in a static painting.

Time Dimension Reading

But why? Why can Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 capture the traces of time well, while Sad Young Man on a Train can't? The first reason is the existence of a visual center. As mentioned in the previous section, the visual center of Sad Young Man on a Train is too clear, with the man stationary in the middle of the painting, while the visual focus of Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 is blurred. What needs to be considered is that time is a dynamic dimension, which means that expressing time must always be a dynamic process. Paintings are static, so when the picture has a clear visual center of gravity, the audience's attention will first focus on this static subject and then observe the dynamics around it.

Marcel Duchamp

In Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2, Duchamp, in painting the woman without clear boundaries, make it easier for the audience to regard each moment in term as an equal part of the whole. In this case, the audience sees a more continuous dynamic itself. Another key point is the introduction of spatial scale. There is no clear spatial range in Sad Young Man on a Train, and the content of the picture is only about the expression of movement. Even if people can understand that the man is moving with the train, it is more like a feeling and extension of space rather than actual movement. In Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 , with its clear spatial range, the dynamic is combined with the static space, and people see what happens in different times in the same space. Here, Duchamp makes time clear.

We seized the light, Yet a contour of time

In the past people’s lives revolved around sunrise and sunset, the most essential markers of the day. The appearance and disappearance of the sun, the natural light became the symbol of real and symbolic time. Religious buildings always pay attention to time and light, although there is a natural conflict between them. The bell sound of the church sets a standard of how to live and order the day. Compared with rural life, where the rhythms of nature control time and how we experience it, man-made mechanical devices split the “Day” into specific hours. In this way, we gain a clearer, though more inorganic and cold sense of time. Ironically, religious buildings were trying to do something different than simply marking time. It is more about the collision of the light and stained glass, fragmenting the light into color pieces. The dazzling and overabundant experience of light minimizes the difference of changes in light with the time passing and blurs people’s concept of it. But, it’s not the light itself anymore.

Light and Time converge

Light is chaotic. It’s soft, it’s sharp, it can be whatever shape people want it to be. As the world became more industrialized and metropolitan, people scaled down time further into minutes and seconds. Time was not a feeling of light changing anymore, but the movement of two hands on a clock. Time was turning into a norm and just as artists saw the potential of time in painting and photography, architects were seeing new possibilities, too.

Church of the Light

Tadao Ando’s Church of the Light (1999) is a phenomenal re-imagining of religious architecture. The motive for this is a little impure. It’s not a “concern” concern but a side product of practical thinking. People need safe, quiet, isolated space for praying and meditation. The Church also wants not only to attract believers, but also new people. So, hundreds of thousands of churches have been built and not many of them think of light, but Ando did.

An amazing achievement in time and art

Though this sounds quite simple, just create a gap in the shape of cross on a wall to introduce natural light, but of course Ando’s work does more than that. First, he created a closed black box, so that the existence of any light would be emphasized. The strong contrast between light and dark takes on a sacred quality. However, because Ando limits the light coming in, the atmosphere is still closed off, protected. What does change is that the straightforward cutout adds the dimension of time back to the building. It is both a Sanctuary and part of the natural world.

The light entering from the opening forms a projection on the surrounding walls. This projection becomes a conceptual pointer that slowly rotates over time. And because the light is directly in front, it becomes the visual center. People's sight unconsciously moves with the changes of light, which allows one to more clearly and easily detect changes in the projection. In this process, the darkness in the space changes from completely swallowing up the space, to softly wrapping itself around the space. We experience time in this shift.

Kimbell Art Museum

As I said before, light is malleable. It can be used to contour time, but it can also erase it. The Kimbell Art Museum designed by Louis Kahn was built in 1972. From the outside, this building, or building complex, does not look like an art museum. It is heavy and closed. The row-like arrangement of simple shapes makes it look more like a factory or a greenhouse. This crowded and heavy feeling makes it impossible to imagine the existence of natural light inside.

But none of that is true. In addition to the long skylight in the middle of the roof, Louis designed a gap at the junction of the arched roof and the wall to serve as a lateral entrance for natural light. He also designed a curved aluminum alloy strip under the roof skylight to reflect the incoming optical fiber. Based on the curved shape of the roof, the gap and the alloy gently diffuse the light and fills the entire interior space.

Due to this unique optic strip, the changes in natural light are difficult to observe directly. All changes are broken down into tiny details. Furthermore, the soft atmosphere inside the space makes visitors feel comfortable and at ease, which allows them to focus more on the appreciation of the exhibits and minimizes the changes in light. As the natural light gradually disappears, the light in the center of the aluminum alloy strip gradually lights up and diffuses throughout the space. Only when all the artificial lights are on, are people aware of the passage of time.

Line and Eraser

Again, why? People have long experienced the passage of time through the movement and change of light. For us to feel that in space, the light needs a stable and continuous environment, or a stage to catch enough details to see the changes. In the Church of Light, Ando creates a natural pull between light and shadow by creating a black box, so that time appears, even if it’s only an outline. In contrast, Kahn minimizes the changes in light and shadow by softening and diffusing the light. Both Kahn and Ando try to bring natural light into our quite artificial worlds.

Ando looking at you

O Time, My Time

We see traces of time everywhere; it is woven into all things, inescapable. When fingers brush rusted metal, time is speaking; when footsteps meet the cracks in the ground, it is speaking; when ginkgo leaves turn golden, it is speaking. Time surrounds us like this, and everything around us holds the potential to become its messenger. In ways sharp or subtle, it touches our senses, urging us to witness and experience it. Its mystery and glow grant those who capture it a rare beauty. And the creator, like a groove on a record, becomes time's very trace, reciting its song.

©Eason Jiang and the CCA Arts Review