Calendarium

2017 / Ephemeral intervention / Variable dimensions

The repeating of situations, and the striking similarity among diverse objects and phenomena, is what led humans to mathematical abstraction: numbers are thus the culmination of the attempts to grasp the concept of multiplicity. In this ephemeral piece, I look back to the origins of the first calendars, which sought to quantify, systematically, the passage of time, according to the movement of the Sun or the lunar phases. I carried out a simple intervention, by first covering a large window in a layer of white soap. I then marked out, by rubbing the glass, the numbers one to twelve, written as back-to-front words. This way, it was possible to observe the effect of the sun as the numbers moved along the room, over the course of the day.