About Time (+ The Black Goo Project) (2016)

Installation, ZKU, Berlin

 

Due to a brain infection, the british musician Clive Wearing was left with a memory capacity of roughly 30 seconds. Following his doctors advice, he started to keep a diary in order to keep track of time. But every page looked the same, filled with entries that all resembled each other.

 

8:31 AM: Now I am really, completely awake.
9:06 AM: NOW I am perfectly, overwhelmingly awake.
9:34 AM: Now I am superlatively, actually awake.

 

Wearing reached a state beyond time; beyond past and future, stuck in the present moment. But (despite of mindful mantras and the flow of Facebook feeds; Twitter feeds and Instagram feeds) we cannot live beyond time.

The question about time - about past, present and future - is crucial within the new epoch within which humans are considered a geological force: The anthropocene. Human activities have had a decisive influence on the global landscape and evolution of Earth. We have transformed and appropiated the atmosphere; the ocean; the wildlife.

In order to problematize our perception of time (and maybe put us within the context of deep time rather than singular lifetimes), the project About time explores coexisting temporalities. It also touches upon the (maybe vain) hopes, the (maybe drastic) actions and the (maybe hard) choices that follows the acknowledgement of a world with several, possible futures.