Unlike all the other art forms, film is able to seize and render the passage of time, to stop it, almost to possess it in infinity. I'd say that film is the sculpting of time.
Interpretation
Film uniquely captures and preserves moments in time, allowing viewers to experience time as an art form.
In this quote, Andrei Tarkovsky expresses the idea that film is distinct among artistic mediums because it has the capability to capture and manipulate the flow of time. Unlike painting or music, film can evoke the feeling of time being halted or stretched, offering a profound experience that allows viewers to engage with moments in a way that transcends mere representation, effectively sculpting time into a narrative form.
In practice
During a film studies class, I shared Tarkovsky's quote to highlight the unique qualities of cinema compared to other visual arts.
AN ARTISTIC DISCOVERY OCCURS EACH TIME AS A NEW AND UNIQUE IMAGE OF THE WORLD, A HIEROGLYPHIC OF ABSOLUTE TRUTH. IT APPEARS AS A REVELATION, AS A MOMENTARY, PASSIONATE WISH TO GRASP INTUITIVELY AND AT A STROKE ALL THE LAWS OF THIS WORLD-ITS BEAUTY AND UGLINESS, ITS COMPASSION AND CRUELTY, ITS INFINITY AND ITS LIMITATIONS.
When I speak of poetry I am not thinking of it as a genre. Poetry is an awareness of the world, a particular way of relating to reality. So poetry becomes a philosophy to guide a man throughout his life.
Art would be useless if the world were perfect.
Perhaps the meaning of all human activity lies in the artistic consciousness, in the pointless and selfless creative act? Perhaps our capacity to create is evidence that we ourselves were created in the image and likeness of God?
Above all, I feel that the sounds of this world are so beautiful in themselves that if only we could listen to them properly, cinema would have no need for music at all.
THE ARTISTIC IMAGE IS ALWAYS A METONYM, WHERE ONE THING IS SUBSTITUTED FOR ANOTHER, THE SMALLER FOR THE GREATER. TO TELL OF WHAT IS LIVING, THE ARTIST USES SOMETHING DEAD; TO SPEAK OF THE INFINITE, HE SHOWS THE FINITE.
Playing and listening to music gives you a sense of fulfilment because you have to put everything in you at its disposal.
I enjoy reading about the lives of musicians, and find many similarities in their ideas of preparation and their utter devotion to this great, eternal language: music.
I think no woman I have had ever gave me so sweet a moment, or at so light a price, as the moment I owe to a newly heard musical phrase.
To write a novel is to embark on a quest that is very romantic. People have visions, and the next step is to execute them. That's a very romantic project. Like Edvard Munch's strange dreamlike canvases where people are stylized, like 'The Scream.' Munch must have had that vision in a dream, he never saw it.
The best books come from someplace inside. You don't write because you want to, but because you have to.
What i like about photographs is that they capture a moment that’s gone forever, impossible to reproduce.
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