Vague Squares
2018
38x30cm each
Paper
Process
working period : 2018. 02. 04 ~ 2018. 03. 01
Inspiration
We are part of this world, but why is it so difficult for us to understand the scientific principles that make the world work?
Heraclitus of Ephesus (late 6th century BCE) said: "You cannot step twice into the same river." And even now, it is still regarded as a general conception of time. We consider the time has a linear structure. This also means that there is only one point that we recognize as the present on the line. The point can exist individually, although it may have a causal relationship with what has happened in the past.
Instead of this, Vague Squares makes time perceived with a concept of accumulation. Briefly, this work was done by adding one sheet of paper per day to the window during the exhibition period so that the color of the paper changed over time. In other words, it is about a way of recognizing the present with all the accumulated moments in the past. The accumulation has a structure of the plane, not one of the linear. And as time goes by, this plane gradually widens. It may be explained as a two-dimensional time structure. And if I borrow Heraclitus' words again with this point of view, you cannot step twice into the same river but every moment you step into the river is included in the present.
It is true that some (maybe most) scientific concepts are too difficult to understand for the public including me. But it is also true that they are not only useful but also good ways to explain fundamental principles of what happens in our daily lives. I sometimes imagine that perhaps, these difficult concepts were actually easy to understand, but the brain may have lost the sense of understanding the world because it was not the most vital for survival in human history. If that is so, thinking with the inconvenient method and the alternative can help restore the way we understand the world we may have lost in the past.
Heraclitus of Ephesus (late 6th century BCE) said: "You cannot step twice into the same river." And even now, it is still regarded as a general conception of time. We consider the time has a linear structure. This also means that there is only one point that we recognize as the present on the line. The point can exist individually, although it may have a causal relationship with what has happened in the past.
Instead of this, Vague Squares makes time perceived with a concept of accumulation. Briefly, this work was done by adding one sheet of paper per day to the window during the exhibition period so that the color of the paper changed over time. In other words, it is about a way of recognizing the present with all the accumulated moments in the past. The accumulation has a structure of the plane, not one of the linear. And as time goes by, this plane gradually widens. It may be explained as a two-dimensional time structure. And if I borrow Heraclitus' words again with this point of view, you cannot step twice into the same river but every moment you step into the river is included in the present.
It is true that some (maybe most) scientific concepts are too difficult to understand for the public including me. But it is also true that they are not only useful but also good ways to explain fundamental principles of what happens in our daily lives. I sometimes imagine that perhaps, these difficult concepts were actually easy to understand, but the brain may have lost the sense of understanding the world because it was not the most vital for survival in human history. If that is so, thinking with the inconvenient method and the alternative can help restore the way we understand the world we may have lost in the past.
<Graphs of Linear and Plane Time>