Among the fundamental concepts on which the operating principle of human consciousness is based, probably the most important is time. With the help of the category of time man forms the notion of movement, discovering for himself the presence of the fourth dimension in three-dimensional space. Like other systems of coordinates that humans use to interact with reality, time is a convention that ensures the contact of the eternal with the transient, the real with the subjective, the transcendent with the everyday. With the help of time humanity justifies its existence in the world of cosmic chaos, striving to prove to itself that it is capable of knowledge and creativity. Therefore, the means which make it possible to assert time as an objectively existing rather than contingent mechanism are of great value for civilization. For with them man seeks to prove to himself that he really exists and has a tangible influence on the universe.

Although no art project can completely avoid the theme of time, some of them put it at the center of their work. An example of this is the Museum Photographs series by the German photographer Thomas Struth. Being, like K. Höfer and T. Ruff, a representative of the previously mentioned Düsseldorf "school" as well as a student of H. Richter (a star of abstract art and one of the most "expensive" authors of our time), Struth touched upon many aspects related to the concept of time in his project. By choosing the interiors of famous museums as his subject matter, Struth was given the opportunity to film spaces that humanity has specifically created to preserve the memory of the past. After all, in order for a system of temporal coordinates to work, it needs reference points marking the beginning, the stages of movement and the directions of its progression.

And so, it is vital to preserve objects from different time epochs, as they become evidence of the existence of temporal change. In this respect, the spaces of museums, where viewers are introduced to works of art from the past, are representative results of humanity's attempts to materialize time and delay change in individual artifacts from bygone eras. It is in museums, literal "cemeteries of art", that people are brought into contact with the objects of dead cultures whose death is a condition for the existence of the modern world. After all, if these cultures were not gone and continued to exist forever, human development would stop and the mechanism of time would cease to function. It is in the museum that man is confronted with one of the greatest paradoxes of his thinking - he wants to live, develop and move forward, but he also wants to reach eternity, which levels all these desires.

In the context of this complex topic, Struth's choice of photography as an artistic medium for the realization of the art project is not accidental. After all, photography is based on the desire to fix time, to preserve a visual testimony of a bygone moment. In this sense, photography is a creative paradox that takes shape, associated with attempts to stop time and demonstrate movement on the plane. Through photography, Struth forms a creative corridor in space and time, showing how works of art from the past become objects of reflection for museum visitors, who, in turn, become protagonists of Struth's work. Looking at the Museum Photographs series, the contemporary viewer becomes a participant in a journey that is part of humanity's global journey in an eternal search for itself. And, in this connection, he must ask himself the question of what this world should become in the future, and for this reason he must become a creative person himself.  After all, due to the conventionality of the concept of time, the future cannot have an end, and the subject, whose perception can only see the artifacts of the past, can only turn his back to the future, inventing and wishing to materialize more and more illusions.

Artem Loginov, for "History of One Photo"