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Visual Art & Digital Photography: Part 2:
Space, Time And Memory
How Experimental Digital Photography can evoke a sense of remembrance

100 years ago the Italian Futurists were concerned with creating art that involved space-time but in addition involved the "interpenetration of space-time and memory" as stated in the book The Museum of Modern Art: The History and the Collection, 1984.

This is a concise description of reality, at least human reality as it is understood today. We all live in the moment and can do no other. Life is lived second to second with no turning around; the passing moment and every person and object exists as part of a space-time continuum that moves forward and never back.

I want to render the prolongation of objects in space.
I want to model light and the atmosphere.
I want to transfix the human form in movement.
I want to synthesize the unique forms of continuity in space.
Umberto Boccioni, Italian Futurist artist

Yet everyone and everything has a past which determines the present and also determines how that present is understood.

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.
Soren Kierkegaard

The addition of memory to an art depicting space-time is intriguing -- because memory, especially detailed memory, is particularly human and a critical aspect of consciousness, which many see as the most human of human characteristics. The concept of time is quite different for the conscious mind. I like to think of it as "meta-time" -- 'meta' meaning time beyond the standard moment to moment existence of time, beyond now -- an almost different dimension of time.

We all work with meta-time every day, yet think little of it. In our minds we can move some things around in time, forward and back, unlike real time -- but there are rules. For example, I can drink a cup of coffee before I go to work, or drink that cup of coffee when I get to the office. I can accomplish an important step in a project today or next week, but I had better not wait until the week after because other aspects of the project need that step to be accomplished first.

Memory is a key component, perhaps the crucial component, of meta-time and our ability to manage, shape and organize time. Because of memory we can learn skills, recall what we have accomplished so far in a task, and build on experience. But beyond the cataloging of our past, it also remembers things that happened in a unique way. It remembers occurrences as events, not measured by seconds or minutes or hours, but rather as an internal experience. This aspect of memory comprehends time beyond the now moment and creates depth, dimension and perspective.

The rhythm of the duration of an event is an experience of our consciousness whose beginning and end is not determined by the clock but by its duration within our consciousness, and once there, it has no other dimensions and no other limits save the limits of the experience itself.
Naum Gabo, Divers Arts, 1962 (a principle founder of the art known as Constructivism around 1920)

Flash forward to art in the 21st Century. I believe, oddly, that static art, such as painting, photography and sculpture, can best depict this sense of reality, this 'interpenetration of space-time and memory' the Italian Futurists wanted to capture 100 years ago. The problem with the time arts such as music, film and dance is that they sweep us along with their power, but don't let us stop and gaze -- unless you hit the pause button.

Static unmoving art, such as a photographic print, allows the mind of each member of the audience to contemplate the work and by doing so to bring their own memories to that work. In my photography, for example, I try to show the reality of the 'interpenetration of space-time and memory' by taking photographs with slow shutter speeds that reveal blur and movement, the intensity and rhythm of the moment in time. But I also try to add the human elements of emotion and sensation. I believe that when I feel deeply, I can communicate this to a viewer.

No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader.
Robert Frost

So, for example, when you see one of my photos of a musician playing, I want you to have a sense of the moment when this guitar was being strummed, to almost hear the sound and to feel the beat of the rhythm -- and you will do this by bringing your own memories to bear, your own memories of deeply felt music in times past.

...to know things in real time, we must bring our memories from past time into the present.
Art History Definition: The Fourth Dimension
By Beth Gersh-Nesic, Contributing Writer (arthistory.about.com)

This is part of a series of articles about visual art and digital photography.
#1. Visual Art & Digital Photography: Realism & Personal Expression
== How digital photography can be both realistic and expressive at the same time
#2. Visual Art & Digital Photography: Part 2: Space, Time And Memory
== How Experimental Digital Photography can evoke a sense of remembrance
#3. Visual Art & Digital Photography, Part 3: Art, Memory & Subjective Truth
== Is figurative art/photography limited while abstract art/photography is not?
#4. Visual Art & Digital Photography, Part 4: A Picture Energy Field
== Composing photographic elements in a dynamic manner

NOTE:See a list of my other articles here at PIXIQ. www.pixiq.com/contributors/rick-doble

For more about my approach to photography see my book: Experimental Digital Photography.

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