4D Final Project: Poetics of Time



Describe the art Project

What is it about?

LIFE TEMPO is about describing a day in my life using different rhythms, supported by a constant metronome tempo.

What has inspired you?

Rudy Mancuso’s Circle of Strangers and TehChing Hsieh’s One Year Performance

Are you trying out a new concept or a continuation of a previous project?

The concept and idea is completely new, but I am taking the transitions from my previous project (wake up at the start and fall alseep at the end)

What do you intend to communicate to your audience?

I want to give a fresh take on daily tasks and change how people see mundane chores.

What is innovative and new about it?

Combining something boring (chores) and something fresh (rhythms)

Objectives and activities of the Art Project

What are you going to make or produce?

A film.

How are you going to produce it?

By using a camera on tripod.

What is the type of work?

Media-based, film.

What is the dimension?

18:9 screen ratio

What is the length of time of this experience you are creating?

1 minute 30 seconds

Art Materials and Equipment for the Art Project

Describe the materials you are going to use.

Camera, tripod, household items, shoes, clothes

What tools will you be using?


Mounting and Installing the Art Project

Describe how you will install the Art Project.

I will be projecting it on the main screen of the classroom.



I wanted to explore the notion of biological time, by creating rhythm in a day in my life. I wanted to show how a person’s mundane tasks can be seen in a different perspective. For example, washing clothes, eating, wearing clothes etc in a certain rhythm, playing with fast ones, such as semiquavers and slower ones such as crochets.

I used a constant tempo that does not change for the whole video, which can signify the consistency of time ticking, heart beating, etc that still continues despite how fast or slow we do our tasks. And the tasks that are done in their certain rhythm correspond to the feeling i feel when i do them and the time of day in which i do these tasks. This allows me to play with how fast or slow time passes without changing the original tempo.


Rudy Mancuso ‘Circle of Strangers”


TehChing Hsieh ‘One Year Performance 1980 – 1981’

Tehching Hsieh’s one year time piece, to me, is the best way to demonstrate biological time, through the hourly punching of the time clock, and leaving his hair to grow for that 1 year.

"Rhythmanalysis" by Henri Lefebvre

“Rhythmanalysis” talks about a method for analyzing the rhythms of urban spaces and the effects of those rhythms on the inhabitants of those spaces. Lefebvre’s concept of rhythm concerns the repetition of a measure at a frequency. He identifies two kinds of rhythms: cyclical rhythms, which involve simple intervals of repetition, and alternating (or linear) rhythms. Lefebvre posits that the human body is composed of several rhythms; in order to observe rhythms outside of the body, the rhythmanalyst must use her or his own rhythms as a reference to unify the rhythms under analysis. Properly put, the rhythm is the conjunction of the rhythmanalyst and the object of the analysis.


Final Video

Reaction to video and feedback

(Thank you everyone for the constructive feed back) :))


Overall improvements
  • More sounds should be incorporated in the smaller areas
  • Create an overall rhythm and have sounds that surround the whole video instead
  • More intricate rhythms?




In-class Exercise: Project 3 Re-visit


Regularity in terms of sounds: footsteps, birds sounds, heavy breathing

Irregularity in terms of sounds: cat roar, jumping and falling into the leaves

Regularity in terms of video: Background, character design

Irregularity in terms of video: Character running

Repetition: Start and end


Successional movement in terms of direction girl is walking

Oppositional movement when girl collides with cat

Attack: girl vs cat

Sustain: Cat roaring


  • Easy to track
  • Expectations: attacks by cat


I think it may be just right, but the part where the cat roars may be too long.