TIME MATTERS
At first glance, TIME MATTERS appears as a quintessentially English aphorism, asserting that time plays—if not the decisive—then at least an essential role in human existence.
Because the neon lettering is rendered in Jan Kuck’s own handwriting, the work acquires an intimate, personal character without losing any of its intersubjective resonance. For it is only through the perception of time—through the felt continuity of the world’s progression, its ceaseless transformation, and its creation of the new—that we are able to develop self-awareness. At the same time, time constitutes the measure of all our experiences, as well as of our plans, desires, and dreams—in short, of life itself.
The sense of the significance of time thus depends profoundly on personal perspective, on the priorities and values by which each of us evaluates our existence.
With TIME MATTERS, Jan Kuck seeks to foreground the universal value of time and to pose the question to which each viewer must ultimately formulate a
personal response:
“What would you change?” — or, as it was asked in Genoa, “Cosa cambieresti?”
It is a question that demands reflection before the opportunity for change has itself elapsed. The responses are collected, digitally scanned and processed with the
assistance of artificial intelligence. Harmful, fascist or commercialised content is filtered out, while the remaining answers are projected onto a canvas or screen.
In March 2023, the MAIIIM Genoa (the national centre for time-based media art) acquired TIME MATTERS as the first work in its collection.
TIME MATTERS is an international project that has been realised in multiple cities since March 2021:
1. Munich – TIME MATTERS Vol. I – Westsee – March 2021
2. Genoa – TIME MATTERS Vol. II – Palazzo Ducale Genoa – June 2021
3. Augsburg – Designwalk.Art, Public Art in Bavaria – Hinter Lech – October 2021
4. Passau – Designwalk.Art, Public Art in Bavaria – Town Hall Balcony – October 2021
5. Regensburg – Unendlich still, Art in Bavarian Cemeteries – April–November 2022
6. Berlin – Citizens’ Festival of the Federal President, Bellevue Palace – August 2022
7. Genoa – Acquisition and permanent installation at MAIIIM – since March 2023
8. Hamburg – Acquisition and permanent installation at the Oberhafen Gleishalle –
since April 2024.
