time is TIME

"time is TIME" is an installation for Milan Design Week 2016, by CITIZEN and Tsuyoshi Tane from DGT Architects, who undertook creative direction of the highly acclaimed 2014 exhibit, “LIGHT is TIME.” CITIZEN and Mr. Tane have worked together since 2013, to pursue the fundamental theme of “time” through “watches,” and Mr. Tane continues to challenge the concept of “time” as “space.” This grand-scale “time is TIME” installation invites visitors to ponder the nature of “time.”

We wanted to think deeply about the question “what is time?” Time contains many individual moments, including one we call “Now.” It is impossible to make time stand still. People and objects grow old, but time is always new. It always keeps moving. Keeps changing. It comes, and it goes. This ever changing flow of individual moments is what we know as “TIME.”
“time is TIME” is an experimental and experiential installation exploring the idea of time. By using approximately 120,000 main plates, we have created two primary spaces: SPACE A and SPACE B. In these spaces, visitors will have a completely new time experience. In this installation, they will experience time as an absolute and everything else as relative. 15 years have passed since we have entered the 21st Century, and in this time every global event directly impacts our everyday life. Our society has become much smarter and fast-paced as a result of globalization. In this milieu, we have a chance to pursue the true meanings of both the individual moments we experience as “time” and “TIME,” the collective passage of these moments. In the “time” that is “Now,” all of us on Earth are equally connected to the same “TIME.” “time is TIME” is our challenge in the 21st century to introduce a new vision of “TIME.”
Tsuyoshi Tane (DGT.)