Performing Bodies: Time and Space in Meister Eckhart and Taery Kim

What is time, what is space and how do they relate to each other? Even

to pose these questions is to presume their existence, says Meister

Eckhart in his Commentary on Exodus, from where he then develops

his own view on the subject. Although far from having become mainstream,

his definition of time as presentiality and space as non-categorical

creativity had an enormous influence throughout history, particularly in

the arts. In this thematic volume the contributors explore the concepts

of time and space in Eckhart’s thought, situating these historically,

philosophically, theologically, and culturally, whilst focusing on their

interpretation in art works, particularly by the American-Korean

performance and video artist Taery Kim (b. 1988) who refers explicitely

to Eckhart. Kim advances the questions ‘what is time?’ and ‘what is

space?’ as embodied questions in her performances and video

installations, thus exploring Eckhart and inquiring into the ways we can

think about our relationships, as embodied subjects, to the vagrancies

and bindings of time and space now. Drawing together artists, art

historians, theologians, and philosophers, as well as building on

existing scholarship, this volume provides the first lengthy discussion

of spatio-temporality in Eckhart’s writings, highlighting Eckhart’s

relationship to performance art, and the works of Kim.