The following writings contain different segments about the concept of time. To best describe certain feelings and thoughts concerning my ideas and work I have used poetry and short stories in a prosaic manner. I also felt it necessary to include some historic facts about the history of time and its measuring devices

Thune, Lucie Noel

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Virginia Commonwealth UniversityVCU Scholars CompassTheses and Dissertations Graduate School1998Sense of DurationLucie Noel ThuneVirginia Commonwealth UniversityFollow this and additional works at: http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etdPart of the Art and Design Commons© The AuthorThis Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at VCU Scholars Compass. It has been accepted for inclusion in Thesesand Dissertations by an authorized administrator of VCU Scholars Compass. For more information, please contact libcompass@vcu.edu.Downloaded fromhttp://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/1279SENSE OF DURATION by LUCIE NOEL THUNE B.F.A., California College of Arts and Crafts, 1993  Submitted to  the Faculty of the School of the Arts of Virginia Commonwealth University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Fine Arts Richmond, Virginia May 1998 SENSE OF DURATION: Time in the sculpture and poetry by Lucie Noel Thune ''A poet takes on Time like a man going into a knife fight ....'I -Larry Levis The following writings contain different segments about the concept of time. To best describe certain feelings and thoughts concerning my ideas and work I have used poetry and short stories in a prosaic manner. I also felt it necessary to  include some historic facts about the history of time and its measuring devices. SENSE OF DURATION The flow of time is something we are surrounded by and usually take for granted, although every so often one wishes to capture a moment of ecstasy or  pause for a while to feel our own existence in time. I t  is the complexities of time I am investigating in my work. On one hand you have the physical visual change of time evolving, one we can experience with our senses, see with our eyes, smell or  hear. On the other you have the man-made knowledge of time, the measurement of a year, a minute or  a millionth of a second. With both there is a beginning and an end, an interval separating two points on a continuum, a duration. I have, for the past years, been interested in creating work that deals with these issues. By using materials that change slowly through a certain time span, I hope to convey the notion of time passing. On a philosophical note I feel a need to remind the viewer that time is always with us, that it is a motion, or  pressure that pushes us, not through space, but through a dimension we can not see. Sense of Duration In a blink of an eye it appeared as though razor blades swept through into sounds of blades bumping into each other in rhythmical orchestra like wings of birds in takeoff shimmer and flicker flicker and clinker. Movement of sand shifting drifting then gone into another dimension leaving nothing behind but the dust. Marks and incom~reliensible numbers That morning, she walked through the heavy snow thinking about mark making. The Norwegian Cephalopods fossils were small sea creatures, fragile, and short lived yet the oldest mark on earth six hundred million years is an incomprehensible number. Archaeologist had recently discovered the oldest human footprint transformed into a fossil a t  Capetown. Two 2" deep and eight" long. One hundred and seventeen thousand years ago. The footprint was leading down towards the lagoon to have a drink of water, perhaps? Knowing nothing of it. I see where I have been walking across a park after snow fall, my tracks scuffed out in the snow on the path. I see the path continuing, awaiting my footsteps. But are these places the past and the future? Returning to the path behind me, I encounter none of the events I entered a moment or  a year before. There are trees, leaning branches, and birds singing, each ridged in space as before, but looking a t  my watch or  hearing the clock striking in the Cathedral or knowing the day, I am forced to admit that this park of white hills and trees has drifted, or  moved with the direction of time. timeus The sensible cosmos was created by Demiurge and carefully patterned after the eternal world of intelligible essence. Although the creator wished to  make the cosmos perfect, whole and eternal, no created thing would last forever. So, t o  establish order in the chaotic heavens, he made out of eternity an image going according to  number, the moving image, the image of time. Plato's Timaeus was written between 27e and 39d. I t  is the first recorded theory of time in our western tradition, although Plato's admittedly unphilosophic account was written and understood as mythology. (Coveney 22)  In the history of philosophy the first discussion of time was not concerned with knowing, calculating or determining the time of the day, but rather in the larger matters of infinite versus the finite, or as Plato was concerned with it, eternity versus time (Aspects 21 -25). In Lacanian terms, we might call this opposition: the Other versus the Self. I t  is what constitutes the ineffable that stands in contrast to our mortality. Ironically, it is our ego's briefness and the briefness of things that surrounds us in the world that illuminate the Other, as I have tried to illustrate in my poem "immortality" immortalitv The skeleton of the Dinosaur lay in front of her like a map of a forgotten planet "Forget me not'' it said in invisible letters. There was a picture of a Sphinx with its nose cut off and a Viking Ship preserved by the blue clay of the earth, an armature of a Sami sledge, a picture of my great grandfather at  North Cape with a motor bike, a room from my childhood, a book of biology, a seed, an apple, the light tap of a blue flower petal dropping to the ground. THE ICE MERCHANT ephemeral gambler Whispering and sound of bells from the monastery at  dawn, he ties his tools to his body and starts climbing. The Himalayan mountains elevates 87 degrees upwards, superior vertical lines horizons at  9600 feet above the ocean. This is where he travels in the cold, dry and Arctic. He selects carefully, trips and falls then carries the heavy blocks on his back. The Sun Bittern still in the air watching the ice merchants watchful movement of feet downhill while the sun is beating knowing that if his load is light at  the first temple he won't make it back in time. (Sun Bittern. A crane-like tropical American bird is often spreading it's wings and tail in a showy display. I am unaware of its existence in the Himalayan mountains. ) EPHEMERAL MATERIALS/time in movement rhythm and sound I have focused on two types of knowledge that constitute ephemeral materials, the abstract knowledge of biology and the actual experience of touching and seeing what occurs. Both interact with a duration of time. Brief meeting At 0° celsius the hexagon water molecule develops in a pattern of six. Like a beehive of frozen water. Each group of cells creates six new cells which gravitate towards each other to  again reach a larger formation, until the water surface is covered with a thin blanket of ice. A garden pulled out of the water by the cold. Equilibrium is sustained. For a moment, a year, a niillennium perhaps. Until again, the unforgiving law of celestial existence penetrates the atmosphere, and the pattern erupts. In the beginning it was the movement that these materials trigger, their natural change over time, the pliysical change we can witness with our eyes, that fascinated me. When something transforms from solid t o  liquid, as with ice to  water, there is a movement of mass from one place to  another, a decrease of shape at  one point and an increase of growth at  another. This transformation is not only an action in real time, but a physical movement of materials in space. After observing the materials' natural movement I was led t o  explore the possibility of controlling the materials by controlling their circumstances. Mechanical devices like water pumps and refrigeration units became practical tools in my investigation. I t  allowed me to  use materials in unexpected ways and t o  create illusions for the senses with light, movement, heat, cold, smell and sound. I t  is in the marriage between materials and images that I find (what I call) visual rhythm. I look for rhythm in the action of the materials I use and in the different stages in the temporal development. I use repetition of motifs, images, materials or symbols, or a slight repetition of shapes. If I have a pattern of similar shapes and add alternation in different quantities I get a pattern of flow, a pattern of stress, and unstress which creates a contrast. Sound and rhythm are both tools I use to  orchestrate my work. Because my materials are so specific, I like to  think that they speak for themselves. I choose them for what they have to  say and my role is t o  discover their potential and highlight it. If the things I choose to  use make a sound, I incorporate it in my work, like the sound of water dripping. Although soulids are a frequency which can be understood by hearing, I think of sounds as color. The intensity of sounds that we surround ourselves with every day but never really hear, as with mechanical devices, can be quite effective when singled out in a gallery situation. Then there are red sounds, sounds that penetrate our nervous system and take hold of our senses. Like the sounds of crickets in late August. The gradual intensity of dark orange, red and deep red, intervened with silence only to  let you know how loud it was. AII types of sounds are influencing our state of mind, creating atmospheres or moods like colors in a large painting. In part I feel this is how a landscape of associations, nioods or feelings can be manipulated. WATER CLOCKS / CLEPSYDRAS, water thief. Much  of the  history of t ime is the historical development of devices which measure it. Sand, water, burning incense, candles, melt ing of ice, shadows, the  sun, the  moon and the  stars, a l l  of these have been used as devices of measurement (Cowan i passum). water thief (There was nothing to it, but ....) One large stone vessel filled with water to the rim two girls pulling a monkey three hands writing geometry four boys a t  t he  wel l  f w e  holes in the bottom of the  vessel allowing six millimeters decrease of water level to drop seven old ladies shaking their  heads complaining ''water thief" eight eyes watching form a ship near by nine wooden dowels holding the vessel in perfect upright posit ion ten  voices celebrating wine to their  lips eleven watch keepers circulating, meditating, contemplating twelve engravings on the inside wal l  of the  vessel. One  for each hour of the  day two smaller one for every half  hour three for night t ime four for seasons f w e  for leap year six for holidays seven for harvest eight for full moon nine for solstice ten for good luck eleven for new year twelve for each month of the  year. Water for wine they said... water for wine. Water clocks or Clepsydras, as the ancient Greeks called the, was also referred to  as water thief. (Cowan 58-9) The Greeks called their water clock this because it offered them the concrete image of time, it became regular and even. I t  became mathematical and independent of nature, stolenout of the current of events. Today we are dealing with a different type of measurement, we have a global time system that offers us an exact knowledge of time anywhere in the world we might be. The focus of time has shifted form measuring time with the help of celestial bodies to a stable electronic system and yet further as dividing time into fractions. The advantage of a stable time apparatus is vital to the globalization, the electronic network, military forces, science and so on. Although we like the allusion of longevity and gain of time in a day, the knowledge of time belongs to the practical world. As in the world of art, tme becomes stagnant, sterile and invisible during the realm of creation. atomic age Ladies and Gentlemen! They found out that atoms and molecules sing. Their resonance absorbs and emits electromagnetic radiation at its own characteristic frequencies. How lucky! They could find a use in singing afater all, taking music to a higher level. This was in fact a new music of the spheres, because the resonances were inherently stable over time and space. How wonderful! Today's singing atom is exactly like the one a million years ago or in another galaxy. This meant that the singing atom was a potential "pendulum" with a reproducible rate that could form the basis for an atomic clock. Progress. The singing atom became the new international unit of time. The second was defined as exactly 9, 192, 631, 770 cycles of the atoms resonant frequency. This would replace the old second that was defined in terms of the earth's motion. Ladies and gentlemen, here was a singing cesium atom the new time standard that would keep time to  about one-millionth of a second per year. But, wait a minute. Dear Highest of Judges, what happened to dramatic pause? Bibliography 1 ) Aspects of Time: an Anthology of essays on time, edited by Patrides, C.A. University of Tornoto Press, 1976. 2) The Arrow of Time Coveney, Peter, Highfield, Roger, Fawcett Columbine. New York, 1990. 3) Time and its Measurement, Cowan, Harrison, 1. The World Publishing Company, Cleveland and New York, 1958 4) Journal of Crystal Growth, Maeno and Takahashi. San Francisco, lrarcourt Brace, 1989 5 )  Froken Smillas Fornemmelse for Sne, Peter Hoeg, Copenhagen, Munksgaard and Rosinante, 1992 Note on Poems: These poems have been composed over the last months by me. Much of their information has come from the text 1 have listed above, however, I did not directly cite every source I made in the poems back t o  my research. I felt this would damage the lyrical aspects of them. 

Sense of Duration

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Sense of Duration

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