335transition, but only a continual passing through.’ (Stalder
2009, 25)
Literature: Stalder 2009; Waldenfels 1990Space can only be comprehended through time, and time can
only be comprehended through space. Given the consecutive
character of their continuous forms, both time and space are
experienced only through distinctions between and sequences
of points in time or space, between which the respective space,
event or situation is stretched. Stretches of road are express-
ible through time designations, while intervals between events
are experienced as spaces of time. Architecture’s constitutive
conditions include the interrelationship between static pres-
ence and temporal process. Despite its indispensable stability
and rootedness in place, a building is never perceived from
a purely static position. In spatial perception, we establish
distances at every position in space, and we experience their
overcoming as moments in time. Emerging from spatial con-
tinuity is temporal succession. In architecture, time is con-
veyed primarily through > movement and > use, through ‘se-
rial vision’ (Cullen 1961/1971), by passing through spatial
> sequences and a succession of physical actions. Grasped
as > event, architecture is constituted in its spatiotemporal
processes through the interaction of many varied influences,
separate lines of development, and complex processes.
The building itself is not a purely static object, but is in-
stead subject to changing conditions and temporal processes.
By operating movable parts such as doors, windows or shut-
ters, parts of the building are altered, opened or closed to a
minimal degree, and to a greater extent, by folding or sliding
walls, for example in the traditional Japanese house or in Ger-
rit Rietveld’s Schröder House. Through various constellations
of > screening and degrees of > accessibility, the relationship
between retreat and common areas is shifted. In residential
building in particular, attempts have been made to respondTime