Attempting to visualize concept of “time” has a great tradition in contemporary art, in particular in conceptual art in the 20th century. The starting point for that consideration are conceptual activities in Polish contemporary art and their influence on the didactic program of teaching photography – the topics and selections taken for the visual structure of the work. Discussion on the example of selected works of Polish conceptual art of the 20th century, including the effects of the didactic process of the Photography and Multimedia Activities Studio that I run at the Academy of Fine Arts in Łódź. As a part of research and didactic observations, for many years students have been given the task of creating a visual work that shows the passage of time. The selection of photographic pictures and the method of working should be treated as an attempt to create a personal commentary on the surrounding reality. Students are choosing a theme, planning and recording over for a long period of time, for example a few weeks or months, the natural variability of the motif with particular emphasis on the type of light resulting from the time of day and the environment. The collections are presented in the form of a slide show, and the rhythm of the appearing photographs can be variable, consciously used as an additional artistic element. In the initial phase, the students discuss the selected issue and chosen artistic convention, while the technique and artistic form are free. In my own artistic work, too, the aspect of the “time” is an important factor. In many art works and art projects it is an important semantic element. Years later, I return to the same themes or places to reinterpret them and relate to the past. It concerns both the topic, issues and the composition of the visual implementation. Examples of artistic projects implemented over many years are cycles regarding the identity of the home city, for example “Postcards from Łódź”, “genius_lodzi” or “The Origin”.
