The intimate relationship between space and time has oft been the subject of philosophical cogitation where part of the ponderings focus on the relationship between the two and how they coexist while at the same time evoking confrontations over which is superior – a paragone gone awry.
This is one of the themes expressed in W.J.T. Mitchell and Mark B.N.Hansen’s chapter titled “Time and Space” in the book “Critical Terms for Media Studies” where the history of this argument is closely tied to the arts: painting/drawing, and music. From Plato’s perspective of space being of “the material world” and time being the “habitation of the soul” to Gotthold Ephraim Lessing’s work “Laocoon: An Essay on the Limits of Painting and Poetry” where Lessing contrasts the two although he notes that they are closely tied together.
Another interesting theme that comes out of this chapter is what appears to be a loss of innocence – or in the very least – a loss of the magic and mystique of interplay between these two dimensions with the surreptitious revolutions of 20th century technology – specifically within what Martin Heidegger and Theodor Adorno’s labeling of the entertainment industry as being the “culture industry”. Within the chapter terms are used such as “assembly-line work”, “temporal conformity”, and “industrialized entertainment”, alluding that the medium and its content lose their connection to the long standing tradition of comparing the dance between time and space.
Figure 1
An interesting exhibit by Tomás Saraceno (see figure 1) shows a floating structure in which guests can walk and bounce through. Tomás links space to layers of membranes – drawing the relationship to String Theory.
Ultimately both time and space are interrelated and cannot as easily be pulled apart as most of their interplay cannot be separated from each other, just as two sides of one coin cannot be detached from one another. But perhaps the tightest of bonds that time and space share is that of infinity, for which both are tightly bound to.
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