Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Time Kawara
Time Kawara
nl/kron
Karlyn De Jongh
Global Art Affairs Foundation, Leiden, The Netherlands, +31 6 3943 7090
info@globalartaffairs.org
Abstract
In the history of art, time is not frequently taken up as the artistic topic in itself. While time has
been sporadically present in the work of certain single artists such as Claude Monet or within
movements like Futurism, where speed and change were highlighted, only over the past several
decades, has time become a more explicit topic in art. In this article, time is addressed by
discussing the work and thoughts of three contemporary artists who have taken this concept as
a guiding motif in their work: Roman Opalka, Tatsuo Miyajima, and Rene Rietmeyer. Their
work makes clear that time in art is strongly related to actual and individual life-time and is
concerned with creating an attentiveness to human existence in relation to time as a continuing
entity.
Keywords
time, visualizing time, art, life-time, death, infinity
Introduction
As a curator for the project Personal Structures: Time Space Existence and
together with my colleague Sarah Gold, I organize exhibitions and symposia
and publish texts dealing with the concepts of time, space, and existence. The
project was initiated in 2002 by the Dutch artist Rene Rietmeyer, who defined
these concepts as essential themes for his own artworks. His plan in inaugurat-
ing this project was to influence developments in contemporary art by creat-
ing Personal Structures as a platform for artists to communicate and to develop
their work through exhibitions, symposia, and publications. The June 2007
symposium in Amsterdam featured the concept of ‘time’ and represented the
first in an ongoing series of events. In organizing these events, we intended our
goal to be to present artists from various generations and different parts of the
globe. Each of these artists engages with the concept of time in his or her own
© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2010 DOI: 10.1163/156852410X561880
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 89
[On Kawara] says: “if I am not finished between Berlin and New York, then I must
destroy this Space-time, this period, this Date Painting.” To me that is not logical,
because time is in everything and because that is the case, it should not be necessary
for him to destroy his painting. This determination or fixation that he has, seems to be
completely Japanese. It has nothing particular to do with time.1
While the issue about destroying a particular work if the painting is not fin-
ished before midnight is clearly a calendrical point, it also happens that On
Kawara sometimes paints two Date Paintings in one twenty-four hour period.
For example, NOV. 3, 1989 exists twice. In addition, the way of painting a
particular date, the language and calendrical conventions depend on the loca-
tion where On Kawara finds himself when he is painting: NOV. 3. 1989 seems
painted in the USA, whereas 26 OTT. 1990 is more likely to have been painted
during a stay in Italy. It seems On Kawara focuses on the day in relation to
himself as a person, rather than an overall time that counts for everyone, and
seems in that sense more concerned with the concept of existence within time
and space, than with time as such.
Another artist dealing with time is the Taiwanese performance artist Tehch-
ing Hsieh. After growing up in Taiwan, Hsieh came to the United States in
1974, where he stayed as an illegal immigrant for fourteen years, until he was
granted amnesty in 1988. During this period, Hsieh made five One Year
Performances in and around his studio in New York City, and started his
Thirteen Year Plan. His performances were based on severe and self-imposed
restrictions, such as not seeking shelter and choosing instead to live outdoors
in New York for an entire year, or imprisoning himself in a cage for a year,
while neither reading nor talking. Using long durations such as these, Hsieh’s
1
Karlyn De Jongh and Sarah Gold, Roman Opalka: Time Passing (Leiden, Netherlands:
Global Art Affairs Foundation, 2011), 18.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 91
performances centralize time as the main theme of his work, making art and
life simultaneous, showing they are integrated activities. As demonstrated by
the restrictions of his chosen performances, Hsieh understands his biography
as a life sentence. Since the millennium and released from the restrictions of
the Thirteen Year Plan—a thirteen year period in which he allowed himself to
make art, but not to exhibit it publicly—Hsieh is, as he told me, no longer
“doing art.” His performances were so extreme and demanding that he has
stopped actively making art performances. Now he is “doing life.”2
The work of the previously mentioned artists makes clear that certain con-
temporary art impinges on time directly in its impact on individual life times.
This personal endeavor seeks to create a direct physical awareness of time. This
is not, however, a solipsistic exercise; through this temporal awareness, the
artist reaches out his vision to the viewer. The artwork thus functions as the
medium of primary experience (the artist’s) for another fundamental experi-
ence (the viewer’s). As well, such art translates theorizing about time into real-
istic praxis. Thoughts and life are integrated, art and life no longer occupying
a divide. To this end, an artist successfully working with time lives his thoughts
and lives his art. As the Austrian artist Arnulf Rainer once said, “For 24 hours
a day, my principal occupation consists of working as an artist, discussing with
myself, and thinking about money that is to be spent. Earlier on I also did
what others consider to be living.”3 And he adds in an interview for Personal
Structures, almost 40 years later: “Life, as it appears, is a pale reflection of art,
of artistic creation.”4 Rainer’s words show an awareness that for him a limited
24-hour day mercilessly demands priorities in the service of art.
This demonstration of a direct awareness of time is active in the works of
three contemporary artists: Opalka, Miyajima, and Rietmeyer. All three have
dedicated themselves to time for a number of years. My selection of these
particular three artists is based on the fact that they come from different parts
of the world and represent different generations. On the other hand, their
2
Not only more established artists, but also younger artists represent the concept of time in
art: some examples are the Belgian artist Kris Martin who addresses time using found objects,
and the Japanese performance artist Sasaki who draws life-time on the beat of the heart. Each of
these artist’s work is deeply individualistic and personal. I have chosen not to focus on these
artists in this essay, but rather on three others who have spoken extensively about the ‘matter’ of
time and whose work has been consistently obsessed with time over a period of many years.
3
Arnulf Rainer in a text from 1971, as quoted by Peter Lodermeyer in Peter Lodermeyer,
Karlyn De Jongh and Sarah Gold, Personal Structures: Time—Space—Existence. (Cologne,
Germany: DuMont, 2009), 402.
4
Ibid.
92 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
All the machines we know of, the clocks, “tell” the time, but I “show” time, and that
is something entirely different. This is the painterly solution to the question concern-
ing what a visualization of time might be. In this sense numbers accomplish best what
we up to this day may show of time in the sense of progression, in the sense of dyna-
mics, in the sense of the unity and the expansion of time.6
Opalka starts each picture at the top left corner and paints from left to right,
ending at the bottom right, using a “no. zero” brush to ascertain the graphical
dimension and the legibility of the numbers drawn. The numbers are approx-
imately 5mm high, a size that is easily visible for the artist when he is painting
the work and allows him to paint the two circles of the figure eight, keeping
the center open. To date, this has resulted in approximately 230 paintings,
which he calls Details—each is a detail of the continuous series that started
with 1 and goes on into infinity.7 Opalka’s paintings are not, however, solely a
progression of numbers on a canvas. At least three significant additional aspects
of Opalka’s work contribute to his interpretation of time.
First of all, we encounter the background color of the canvas. While the
numbers from 1 to infinity are painted in white, the background color changes
5
All of Opalka’s paintings are dated with the year 1965 followed by “/ 1-∞.” Different works
are indicated by the first and last number of the particular painting. Each painting is an element
of this one, continuous work and represents an element of the progression of numbers from 1 to
infinity.
6
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 42.
7
This is the number of paintings Opalka mentioned in the summer of 2008.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 93
gradually over time. This change was part of the original concept: Opalka
started with a black background, adding 1% white color for each canvas back-
ground in the years to come. The addition of 1% white was based on an esti-
mate of a specific but merely statistical duration: at the time Opalka began this
work, men born in his region of Poland were estimated to reach 75 years of
age.8 Through a quick mathematical equation, Opalka concluded that by add-
ing 1% white to each successive painting meant that he would be painting
white numbers on a white background by the time of his 75th birthday. Now
it is 2010. Opalka has been painting white on white for four years now, and
he will be painting white on white until the day he dies (Figure 2). The white-
ness he describes as well-earned; he deserves it after having spent all these years
painting. White is certainly an issue for Opalka: he likes the idea that his hair
has become white over the years and that his eyes have become lighter. Con-
versing with him in German also allows for a pun: weissheit (whiteness) or
weisheit (wisdom). Despite his playful comments, whether he really enjoys it
is unclear. Opalka’s position towards this seems mixed: on the one hand, hav-
ing this awareness about our short life-time makes him enjoy his life every day;
on the other hand, living out his program is a sacrifice for the artist, continu-
ing to paint numbers until he can no longer stand straight in front of his
canvas.
Secondly, while painting his numbers, Opalka simultaneously records the
numbers on a tape recorder in a monotonous voice. He speaks the numbers in
the Polish language, his mother tongue. Similar to English, the enunciation of
numbers in Polish is “logical”: the numbers come in order of appearance; the
number ‘85’ is thus eighty-five and not, as in German fünf-und-achtzig or in
French quatre-vingt-cinq. This way of articulating numbers stresses linearity
and sequence over mere information. When his paintings are exhibited, the
sound of his voice fills the room and creates a contemplative atmosphere. The
audio used for these exhibitions is a mix of various recordings of spoken num-
bers; one hears numbers in a random order intended to reflect one’s usual
haphazard thoughts. The artist chose this combination of an audio and visual
display of time because it manifests two different times simultaneously: the
linear time of the painting and the non-linear time echoing in one’s head as
one views the painting.
Opalka shows not only ‘time passing’, but also his lifetime passing. Even
though his life-time is also integrated in his Details, most clearly Opalka’s life
is recorded in his Auto-portraits (Figures 3 and 4): after each day of working in
8
Opalka was born in France to Polish parents and returned to Poland in 1935.
94 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
his studio, the artist takes his own picture, using a camera installation that
stands in front of the canvas as he paints. The photos show the artist’s face,
frontal, wearing the same type of white shirt and the same haircut. On the
background is his painting, displaying the numbers he has just added. Because
the visual aspects of the photographs remain rigorously the same, the facial
effects of time are dramatized. When hanging the photographs, Opalka takes
his own height as a reference, registering the change of his height over time—
from 177 to 170 cm. Even though these photographs are called Auto-portraits,
they are not merely self-portraits. In his own words, “I do not tell about my
life; I make life manifest.”9
The inspiration for Opalka’s concept occurred in 1964, when the artist was
33 years old. He had been waiting for his wife in the Café Bristol in Warsaw,
Poland. She was two hours late, and he had time to think about his future.
Although the artist was already quite well-known, he was struggling with his
work. He wondered how he might succeed in painting time. Previously, from
1959 to 1963, he had been painting his ‘hourglass paintings’ called Chronomes:
white dots on a black background. He recognized his dilemma with these
paintings. It was impossible to locate these works’ beginning and end, which
could be neither measured nor determined. These Chronomes, he felt, lacked
direction, but Opalka believed that time, by contrast, possesses an unequivo-
cal direction. Opalka’s reflections were influenced by the question of ‘What is
left to do?’ a popular point of discussion at the time concerning the end of art.
At that point in the 1960s, painting seemed to have exhausted itself. Opalka,
however, realized that no artist had dedicated his work entirely to time, paint-
ing one, continuous work: Opalka 1965/ 1-∞. Through this he found a per-
sonal way out of the impasse that threatened modern painting. Indeed, he
claims that he saw himself as the last avant-garde artist.10 As he was waiting for
his wife, the idea came to him that each dot could be a number. With this new
concept, using numbers to show time, his formalist problems were also solved:
his number 1 would provide a beginning, a direction; and since numerals are
infinite, there would implicitly be no end.
9
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 236.
10
The controversy about the end of art seems mainly a discussion about the end of painting.
The sixties was the start of several new movements as a reaction to this. The Concept Art
movement, of which Joseph Kosuth was one of the founders, or the Radical Painters, of which
Joseph Marioni and Marcia Hafif are examples. I see Opalka outside these movements; he has
found his own ‘place’ in art history by living out his individual program.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 97
From 1 to infinity
After the moment in the Café Bristol, Opalka took seven months to paint his
first number: 1. This simple first movement—one small line—carried terrify-
ing consequences: painting numbers from 1 to infinity for the rest of his life,
doing nothing other artistically than painting ‘time passing.’ The awareness
that this would be his life was overwhelming: “I already knew what this con-
cept was the beginning of. I knew it would continue throughout my entire
life.”11 After a few weeks, the artist developed a heart problem due to the
excruciating strain. He explains that this tension was “not only because it [the
concept] was so good, but because of the sacrifice it meant I would have to
make a life long for this work.”12 He spent one month in hospital, and even
today recalling this experience affects Opalka.
Opalka claims that he better understands time as well as life at this point,
although he quickly denies any deeper understanding: “How can you under-
stand a thing as stupid as our existence? Maybe that sounds too brutal, but this
existence makes no sense; it is nonsense. And this nonsense is my work.”13 For
Opalka, despite our attempts, we cannot understand time. But in the end
Opalka decided to accept living out his program of absolute futility. Even the
excruciating awareness of painting numbers for the rest of his life, without
purpose, did not deter him. For him, the urgency and origin of his program
lie in its nonsense: not only the nonsense of art, but the nonsense of existence
and time. His work is, as he says, “a monument to nonsense.” As he told Sarah
Gold and me when we visited him in France for our Art Project Roman Opalka:
Time Passing,
Our life has no meaning. My work is the nonsense that manifests this. It is comparable
with the German drinking a glass of liquor, or the Frenchman having a glass of wine:
life has no meaning. The German and the Frenchman are right. They are also philoso-
phers, but then they have to show it. That is almost hypocritical, but I think they
should show it. The consequences are very different when you very seriously have these
thoughts that our existence has no sense.14
The wish to make this ‘nonsense’ manifest may arise from the Polish mentality
of that time. As the artist explains, Poland was a socialist country:
11
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 234.
12
Ibid.
13
Ibid., 43.
14
De Jongh and Gold, Roman Opalka, 58.
98 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
It was a Marxist world back then. To work was the goal. Work was like a certain reli-
gion; it was something positive for the economy and for the people. This example, that
is my work, is such a big nonsense . . . I can tell to no worker that what he does makes
no sense at all. He needs to earn money. The nonsense of my work has never been so
strong with regard to production; it is a productive mentality: I had to create some-
thing. But I made something that has no sense: I could not eat or sell it.15
15
De Jongh and Gold, Roman Opalka, 61.
16
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 41.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 99
this aspect of time with going for a walk. Influenced by this book, the artist
explains that “if you go for a walk, you go in one direction, but your head goes
in all directions.”17 What happens in the interim, the relativity of how long the
duration of an hour or two hours may be, cannot be measured. The mind goes
in all directions: “What has happened in his head during his walk, that is time.
The steps are already there, but in between the steps that we take, is our life,
our thoughts.”18 This way of thinking about time is part of Opalka’s program.
With this metaphor of the stroll, Opalka points to a time that is not pro-
grammed, but has a rhythm of its own. This temporal randomness is demon-
strated by the spoken Polish numbers and is illustrated in his paintings: “The
works are not all the same; they are different. This is also the rhythm of my
existence: sometimes I do not sleep; at other times, I do sleep; sometimes I
sleep more, or less. This is the best: not to program yourself . . . In my work I
have created a program, but this program has a lot to do with this imprecise
time span.”19
17
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 41.
18
De Jongh and Gold, Roman Opalka, 31.
19
Ibid., 57.
20
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 40.
21
Ibid., 238.
100 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
Of course, this was only in the sense of a concept. In order for it to be a work I had to
make this sacrifice, otherwise it would only have had a logical basis, but would not be
a work. My work simply contains all aspects of existence. My work is always virtually
complete. It is no problem not to finish a picture. I have always completed the work.
Like my life, it is always complete.23
As humans, we live only a short moment in time. But Opalka also speaks
about infinity with regard to his life: “I cannot know when I will die. I know
that I will die, but the moment when it happens is so infinite because no one
will know that he has died. [. . .] In this sense we are eternal.”24 The knowledge
of the moment of death is important here. We know that we will die, but we
can never know that we have died: the artist constructs a nexus between his
Being-toward-death and his idea that life, like time, is infinite. Death seems to
be a difficult subject for Opalka: on the one hand he sees it as a liberation of
living out his program; on the other hand, he fears it like anyone else.
22
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 42.
23
Ibid.
24
Ibid., 40.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 101
Why I did not explain ‘The Life’ directly is because at the beginning of my perfor-
mance period, I just did not have a clear mind for it, and until 1995 I was just too
immature to use words and also too inexperienced to explain it. Like many others
before me have also done, it means that it is easier to explain ‘Time’ as a concept than
‘The Life.’25
25
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 312.
26
Ibid., 315.
102 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
and his two- and three-dimensional wall installations. Despite the variations,
Miyajima’s work is immediately recognizable. Most are made with LEDs of
numbers that count ‘up’ from 1 to 9 or ‘down’ from 9 to 1; zero is not shown.27
At the point when zero is expected to appear, there is a moment of darkness.
In this way, as Miyajima explains, this numerical absence enlists the participa-
tion of the viewer. The non-appearance of zero is ‘louder’ than the bright lights
of the other numbers:
One other thing [. . .] is to emphasize the deleting of the zero. For example, 9, 8, 7 . . .
the numbers go down in order. Zero will arrive naturally by prediction. At the moment
the zero should come, it gets dark (no number). So, you can come up with the thought
why there are no zeros. There, you can think about zero. So, the numbers go down in
order and go up in order, that is very important and, in fact, that is my expression to
let the audience consciously experience ‘Ku.’28
For instance, in his 2003 work Counter Void (Figure 6) installed in Tokyo’s
Roppongi area, Miyajima goes against the superficiality of the nightlife in
Roppongi and creates an awareness of our own existence. The work is 16 feet
high and 164 feet long. The viewer is dwarfed, overpowered both by the size
of the numbers as well as the light surrounding the numbers. The confronta-
tion with the counting numbers is frightening and perhaps exhilarating in its
relentless presence. Viewers must crane to view the work; close up, one cannot
take in its entirety. Miyajima explains the absence of zero, ‘Ku’ as death: “Rop-
pongi is [a] town of night and [is] filled with desire even more than [in the]
daytime. I dare to bring ‘Death’ to such [a] night in Roppongi, bring ‘Dark-
ness’ to the center of mass media. The artwork will create the black hole of
‘Death’ and ‘Darkness’, and offer [an] opportunity to think of ‘Deeper Life.’ ”29
In his numerical conception of time, the visible numbers 1 to 9 represent
life, while zero functions as its counterpart. For Miyajima, zero is the moment
of death; since death is not visible, a moment of darkness represents it. But
nothingness is only one of zero’s meanings in Miyajima’s work. In stark con-
trast, zero’s other meaning is ‘vast quantity,’ by which the artist indicates future
possibility and potential. The moment of darkness is thus equally the possibil-
ity of a new beginning, a new life. Additionally, the vastness of zero denotes an
27
In an interview with me, Miyajima admitted to have shown zero once, in the work Empty
Sets.
28
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 317.
29
As stated by Tatsuo Miyajima in 2003, on his website: http://www.tatsuomiyajima.com/
en/text/void.html
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 103
Figure 5. Tatsuo Miyajima, C.F. Protrusensitive—no. 3, 2007, 66.5 × 1.3 × 58.2 cm.
12 LEDs. Courtesy: Tatsuo Miyajima and Lisson Gallery, London, UK.
Figure 6. Tatsuo Miyajima, Counter Void, 2003, neon, glass, IC, aluminum,
electric wire 5 × 50 m (installation) / 1 unit : 3.2 × 2.2 m × 6 figures. Collec-
tion of TV Asahi, Tokyo, Japan. Courtesy: Scai The Bathhouse, Tokyo, Japan.
104 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
Three concepts
Each LED in Miyajima’s works is set to constant change. He explains: “Every-
thing keeps changing, life keeps changing . . . Even ‘keep changing’ is constantly
changing.”31 The LEDs count in order 1, 2, 3 . . . or 9, 8, 7 . . . The next number
in the sequence is predictable. When counting backward 9, 8, 7 . . . the num-
bers descend in a predictable order but at zero, the light goes out and there is
no number. After this dark moment of zero, the counting starts all over again.
The numbers continue, presumably forever. The two movements of change
and of continuity are mutually-related elements in Miyajima’s ‘The Life.’ He
says: “What continues forever changes ‘The Life,’ where the prime elements
are birth and death. Both those changes and the process of changing continue
forever. ‘The Life’ is forever, changing all the time.”32 The concept of ‘forever,’
however, has nothing to do with permanency, which the artist sees as a West-
ern notion. While permanency certainly may operate in ‘to continue forever,’
it may also imply some degree of stasis or stagnancy. The Eastern Weltbild by
contrast recognizes that a ‘shape keeps changing by movement and that con-
tinues forever.’ The movement, not the condition, is eternal. Miyajima adds,
30
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 319.
31
Ibid., 313.
32
Ibid.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 105
“‘Permanent,’ we use it, but one day we humans, or life, will die out. ‘Chang-
ing by movement’ does not die out.”33
Miyajima’s third concept—‘connect with everything’—is often visualized
in his combination of LEDs with technical and natural materials. In one
such artwork, his Pile Up Life project, the LEDs are connected with mud
(Figure 7), combining nature and technology.34 In Miyajima’s installations one
rarely encounters just a single counting LED. But even a single LED reflects
the unity of numbers: for instance, the number 8 is digitally constructed of
seven parts. By the inventive programming of the ‘on’ and ‘off ’ of these seven
parts, all numbers can be created: 8 without its left two lines creates 3; without
the top right corner, it is 6. Miyajima explains: “In fact, the number 8 contains
all numbers. It shows one is many and many is one. One human is the same
person, but the human character changes many times (many). But it is just
one human life (one). ‘The Life’ is one form (one). That one life changes many
times (many). The number 8 contains all these images.”35 In this way, each
LED number is a unity or whole that contains everything: life and the passage
of life-time through the numbers whose endlessly changing constancy con-
tinuously leads towards death, represented by the absence of the predictable
and necessary number zero.
My concept ‘Art in You’ is that the work uses a mirror which projects the inside of the
body of the audience and they, the audience, discover the art inside of themselves.
They notice ‘the Art’ which they had already in them. My artwork is the device for the
audience to take notice of ‘their Art.’ Otherwise, without having any background
knowledge of it, we will not be moved by seeing artwork coming from a completely
different culture, language or religion.36
33
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 319.
34
Exhibition “Tatsuo Miyajima,” Pile Up Life at the Lisson Gallery in London, UK, 25
November 2009-16 January 2010.
35
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 316.
36
Ibid., 313.
106 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
Figure 8. Tatsuo Miyajima, Hoto, 2008, 549 × 208 cm, LED, electric wire,
stainless steel, iron frame, installation view at Contemporary Art Gallery, Art
Tower Mito. Courtesy: Scai The Bathhouse, Tokyo, Japan.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 107
Miyajima presents this mirror by reacting to world events: the project Pile Up
Life, for example, addresses natural disasters and invites the viewer to partici-
pate by selecting a specific speed for the ‘counting’ LEDs. This viewer partici-
pation initiates what Miyajima calls “personal time,” which is the individual
experience of time during an event that feels longer or shorter depending on
the situation. For Miyajima this is the crucial understanding of time: “‘Time’
is definitely a personal thing. The Time concept [which] began in Greenwich
in 1884 [was] the conceptual interpretation of a new modernism. It is based
on the universe and an impersonal general theory. Essentially, ‘Time’ is the
same as an individual’s death. It should be very personal. Individual death
exists in an infinite variety of distinctions. One is not the same as others.”37 In
other words, despite the ubiquity of constant change, permanent continuity,
and unifying connectivity, at the core a personal, individual, and unique expe-
rience of time exerts itself within the human agent. The viewer is drawn into
the work. If it is not through the mesmerizing power of the counting LEDs, it
is through the use of mirror surfaces, such as in the work Hoto (Figure 8), or
the use of sensors following the viewer as he or she moves around in the exhi-
bition space in Mega Death (Figure 9). The ‘Art in You’ concept points to the
idea of personal time: it is about one’s own life-time, as well as that of others,
and it requires the acknowledgement of whether a particular death is “natural”
or “artificial.” The work Mega Death does exactly this. Miyajima explains:
37
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 315.
38
Miyajima’s statement of May 1999 on his website, http://tatsuomiyajima.com/en/text/
megadeath.html
108
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
Figure 9. Tatsuo Miyajima, Mega Death, 1999, LED, IC, electric wire, sensor, etc., 4.5 × 15.3 × 15.3 m installation.
Installation view at the Japan Pavilion, The 48th Venice Biennale. Courtesy: The Japan Foundation and Scai The Bath-
house, Tokyo, Japan.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 109
Death, like the cipher zero, is a dynamic paradox of division and unity, of
finality and redemption.
39
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 396.
40
Ibid., 137.
110 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
Figure 10. Rene Rietmeyer, Life #32, 2007, ceramic and glace, 16 × 16 × 21 cm.
Courtesy: the artist.
Figure 11. Rene Rietmeyer, Portrait of Joseph Kosuth, Roma, September 2008.
In this series there is a total of 72 Boxes, all of which show several variations of
white and red oil paint on wood. Each installation varies in size and may contain
any number of Boxes. Each Box is 25 × 25 × 19 cm. Courtesy: the artist.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 111
still white and bold, but a little softer. As the artist explained at a much earlier
period in his career, “That ‘same’ experience at another moment in time, the
creation and execution of the series shortly after or much later, would unavoid-
ably lead to a different result.”41 In this way, Rietmeyer considers each work as
a unique moment of (auto)biography, a temporal experience captured in material
and dimensional space. Although visually they might be different, conceptually
Rietmeyer is similar to Opalka. For both artists, time is infinite (for Rietmeyer
in both directions), ongoing in one direction regardless of our life and without
repetition. Where Opalka focuses on continuation, Rietmeyer distills the
moment, the ‘here and now’ experience within an ongoing, infinite time.
As the initiator of the project Personal Structures: Time Space Existence, Riet-
meyer is concerned with the nexus of time, space, and existence and refuses to
isolate time from these other two conditions. Nevertheless, time makes itself
felt in his work as an awareness of its intensity and pressure. Rietmeyer empha-
sizes the subjective character of his work: it is about his thoughts, his emo-
tions, his awareness of both the passing of his time and the private space
surrounding him. Predictably then, he is most deeply concerned with the
passing of his own life-time. Rietmeyer resembles Opalka in metonymizing
his work through his body and by extension his life. Rietmeyer also works to
cultivate in others an awareness of passing time. He therefore initiated the
Personal Structures project to broaden the exposure of his own work and
that of other visual artists, such as Opalka, Miyajima, and others, to a diverse
constituency.
Because Rietmeyer’s work deliberately tries to create an atmosphere that
will trigger a dialogue of sorts, he anticipates how others respond to certain
colors. While color may be subjective, most people would pair red with
passion and grey with contemplation, rather than the other way around.
At the symposium TIME, Rietmeyer explains this relation to his work Life
(Figure 10):
For these Boxes I choose the color red because it is human and has a strong presence.
I chose the size, compact; and I chose the material, ceramic, because ceramic lasts a
long time, longer than wood. Within all their formal elements, with all their subjectiv-
ity, these ceramic Boxes represent all my thoughts, me as a total entity. These Boxes,
Life, are proof of my existence. They capture my awareness of the time I could not
41
Peter Lodermeyer, Personal Structures: Works and Dialogs (New York, Global Art Affairs
Publishing, 2003), 136.
112 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
For Rietmeyer, then, red is not primarily symbolic of passion or life, but plays
a more concentrated role representing his life. Red in this way is a memorial
color for human and for individual existence. The Boxes will remain long
after the artist has died, and the red will testify to his work and his life. The
color will ‘remember’ him. As well, red connects to its historical use and in this
way the artist inserts himself in an historical time line: “So when I choose a
color, the choice is always a combination of my momentary emotional condi-
tion and of the knowledge I gained about human thoughts made in the past.
[. . .] With my consciously taken choices, I express myself and my awareness
about human history and the history before humans, my awareness about
Time.”43 Connecting the dots along the historical time line is less about story
and event than about the emotional response to color and form. One could
say that while red denotes life’s passion, its ‘body’ as well as its death, the cube/
box form represents the single container of a life, with its walls and enclosures,
its shape and its contents. A box enacts the paradox of being entirely ‘there’
as identifiable shape, obstacle even, yet able not only to perform its ability
to contain but simultaneously also to hide this interior. The box’s composition
ensures its longevity but also compels us by contrast to acknowledge our
mortality.
42
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 31.
43
Ibid., 30.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 113
about this: “My objects become what they become. Always. Each Box I make
is a honest result of me, my existence at that moment in time and space, an
object from that specific time in my life.”44 In contrast to other Box series
Rietmeyer has made, those comprising Miami Beach, March and September
2006 each is painted on canvas and has strong, vibrant colors. In terms of
Rietmeyer’s personal connection to the work, each colored box functions as a
biography of the artist’s time during that specific year. One could say that the
boxes materially represent the artist’s attempt to capture his thoughts and feel-
ings but without recourse to pictorial narrative. Art can show; it cannot tell.
This intense and personal focus on his lifetime is not, however, self-promot-
ing; Rietmeyer positions himself in the larger art historical landscape: “With
this position within time, I mean: knowledge about the thoughts of other art-
ists I communicate with, but also the knowledge about thoughts and works of
artists who are already dead. Knowledge about us, mankind, about the world
and the space and time we live in. The thoughts standing at the origin of the
intellectual decision about how to construct my work come from somewhere.
That origin is to be found in the time that has passed.”45 In this way, Rietmeyer
expresses not only the time he himself experiences but also the time he has not
witnessed: it is a combination of what he calls “self-experienced” and “non
self-experienced time.”46 “All the knowledge I gained from such people who
lived before my personal, consciously experienced time, have helped me in
creating my own thoughts about all the formal elements I use to make my
works.”47 Rietmeyer refuses to romanticize or sentimentalize his work, prefer-
ring a realistic encounter with the progression of his experiences. Acknowledg-
ing also a time before his own birth, he situates himself in a temporal timeline
similar to that of Opalka: he sees his human life as a miniscule part of this
relentless, continuous, linear time line. But unlike Opalka, this infinite time is
without a beginning or an end. Time IS. Just as numerals are universal, so too
is the box shape ubiquitous. As well, these two expressions are distinctly
human constructions; they enact both a human presence and absence; their
‘thereness’ is the product of human history and personal life, even without the
presence of the individual agent.
Although he understands time as being infinite, Rietmeyer’s Boxes focus
mainly on the past: his work originates in actual experiences. According to
44
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 31.
45
Ibid., 28.
46
Ibid.
47
Ibid., 30.
114 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
Figure 12. Rene Rietmeyer, Miami Beach, March and September 2006, oil on
canvas on wood. Each installation varies in size and may contain any number
of Boxes. Each Box 20 × 23 × 18 cm. Courtesy: collection Mr. and Mrs. Levy,
Palm Beach, USA & the artist.
Figure 13. Rene Rietmeyer, USA, Siesta Key, May 2008. In this series is a total
of 92 Boxes. All Boxes are made from several variations of red oil paint on
wood. Each Box is approximately 18 × 18 × 13 cm. Each installation varies in
size and may contain any number of Boxes. Courtesy: the artist.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 115
a frustrating performance of looking but not knowing, of seeing but not opening. The
three-dimensionality of the boxes acts as a further defiance. There is volume but no
hope of access. The precise orchestration of the boxes, their mathematical shape and
positioning, all recall artistic intervention. The unnaturalness of the work’s geometrical
exactitude celebrates a conquest over human mortality. The uneven red color and the
shadows cast by the boxes testify to the struggle of this expression of life over its even-
tual end.49
48
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 28.
49
Correspondence with Claudia Clausius, Dec. 2010.
50
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 398.
51
Ibid., 30.
116 K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117
as possible.” He adds: “Time itself does not stop. We just cease to exist.”52
By contrast, the Boxes remain. Indeed, his art justifies and redeems the harsh
brevity of human life against on-going time:
Being alive, sensing Life itself, is a fantastic feeling and stimulates many possibilities
for activities. Being aware that there actually is no reason for our existence does not
exclude that we could, or even should, do something beautiful, something good, with
our existence. Life is precious and should not be taken for granted; having encounters
with the world, with other living beings can be fantastic, if you are capable of seeing
the beauty in the ‘otherness’. There is so much to see, so much to experience, life is
much, much too short; it is a pity that I will have to die.53
When I asked Rietmeyer about the difference between him and Opalka, he
replied with acerbic and humorous poignancy:
Conclusion
In this article I have discussed three artists investigating the dynamics of time
in their artistic practice: Roman Opalka, Tatsuo Miyajima and Rene Rietmeyer.
Leaving aside any conclusions, I have tried to show the various aspects of tem-
porality that are, at least for these three artists, critical in their personal inter-
pretation of time. In these instances of contemporary art, time is understood
and possessed through a responsiveness to life’s limited span, especially in
comparison with the infinity of time in general. The predictable ‘end’ of our
own time demands our enjoyment of the moment. Promoting this awareness
of time, together with a wish to leave a trace of themselves, is one of the main
reasons for the impetus to create the art work.
52
Lodermeyer, De Jongh and Gold, Personal Structures, 398.
53
Ibid.
54
Ibid., 399.
K. De Jongh / KronoScope 10:1-2 (2010) 88-117 117
References
De Jongh, Karlyn and Sarah Gold. Roman Opalka: Time Passing. Leiden, Netherlands: Global
Art Affairs Foundation, 2011.
Lodermeyer, Peter, Karlyn De Jongh and Sarah Gold. Personal Structures: Time—Space—
Existence. Cologne, Germany: DuMont, 2009.
Lodermeyer, Peter. Personal Structures: Works and Dialogs. New York: Global Art Affairs Publish-
ing, 2003.
Miyajima, Tatsuo. http://www.tatsuomiyajima.com/en/text/void.html.
——. http://tatsuomiyajima.com/en/text/megadeath.html.