Norwegian National Opre and Ballet, Oslo, 2008

Photo: Katarina Andjelkovic

Experimenting with Temporality and Cinematic Techniques as an Alternative Position in Architecture

INTRODUCTIONThe Greek term kinema signifies motion or movement, while contemporary contextualization of the notion cinema denotes the architectural space in which we become part of the visual system that allows us to perceive a sense of movement and which moves us. As the notion cinematic space presupposes an integrated temporality, and since temporality is traditionally seen as a fundamental limitation to the reception and integration of moving images within the institutions of art and art history, a framework for the interpretation of cinematic space in this research can only be opened through the non-representation of space, variable materialization of the image of architectural space, and the general form of its variability and abstractness, in contrast to its static nature. The theoretical implication of temporality of the cinematic space debates since the 1960s displaces the research focus from the specific analysis of the relational apparatus to the negotiation between arts and moving images, and sets the viewing subject in the central position of the analysis. Given the pervasive convergence of art and moving images we are now witnessing the ‘flowering’ of cinematic forms in visual art. These experiments induced spectator-focused forms of image production and circulation, asking “how have moving images redefined what we think of as ‘art’? How might they have affected our viewing experience?” It seems to me that it significantly relates to the issues of architectural space since our viewing experience, widely debated today in their temporal unfolding, stems from the problematizations of maintaining our essentially kinetic relationship with space. If this is accepted, then such a convergence between space, art and moving images is evidenced through an image-based practice.Commitment towards basing the future of architectural design practice to work with images was part of the preparations to move architectural research to the filmstrip, to become part of the montage process. It is essentially related to what Anthony Vidler highlights in the future of architectural practice, particularly that of Agrest and Gandelsonas, Tschumi and Nouvel. Vidler argues that they see architecture not as a form of language per se, but instead as a form of writing, extending this way the cultural system of which architecture and urban space are elements, to incorporate movement. …

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