Gombrich on image and time

Abstract

There is a very close, indeed intrinsic, connection between the notions of image and time. Images are incomplete unless they are moving ones – unless, that is, they happen in time. On the other hand, time cannot be conceptualized except by metaphors, and so ultimately by images, of movement in space. That only the moving image is a full-fledged one is a fact that was fully recognized and articulated by Ernst Gombrich. Also, Gombrich entertained, and argued for, a rich and well-balanced view of the relationships between pictorial and verbal representation. An antidote to the unholy influence of Goodman, Gombrich deserves to be rediscovered as the figure whose work is ideally suited to providing a founding paradigm for a truly successful philosophy of images.