GRONINGEN STUDIES IN CULTURAL CHANGE GENERAL EDITOR HW. Hoen. EDITORIAL BOARD IN. Bremmer, J.J.H. Dekker, GJ. Dorleijn, A.A. MacDonald, B.H. AJ. Vanderjagt ‘Volume XXXVIT UTOPIANISM AND THE SCIENCES, 1880-1930 EDITED BY Mary Kemperink and Leonieke Vermeer PEBTERS LEUVEN - PARIS - WALPOLE, MA. 2010RTH DIMENSION’ AS A SIGN OF UTOPIA IN EARLY MODERN ART AND CULTURE, Linda Dalrymple Henderson. international system of rescach, The nex step must be taal workers and ther conscious collaboration ~ th ‘who fave already arived at consciousness of an o 147 book Fision in Mot2 LINDA DALRYMPLE HENDERSON “THE ‘FOURTH DIMENSION’ 3 perceptual eapabilities as well asthe general evolution of human eonscious- ness, Rather than Moholy’s pragmatic, collective ‘new vision’, this was a st fora kind of ‘ultrvision’? At mode of seaing in a Lamarckian beliof in inherited. sion of an evolving ‘cosmic consciousness ‘the mystical wadition, theosophy and the apse of appeared in Comedia daring 1909-10 and again ‘in order to understand the sceretion of signifi iy twontieth century, itis useful to begin Bein March 2007, On Malevich and Ousponsky, see Hendecson,4 LINDA DALRYDMPLE HENDERSON tured extensively, using Hinton’s writings on the fourth dimension as a “TH FOURTH DIMENSION" 5 Hinton’ cubes were to stand as a sampling ofthe cubie sections of the hy- percube or tesseract, which would contain an infinite ‘of cubes. By Tearsing the relative positions of sixty-four cubes, for example, a student the passage of successive sections of the tesseract mnal space. In onder to coax readers to taclde his fn which men have part acquired or rather when is brought into co ne in imperfect form —a new horizon opens. Te mind ac- ver, ad in this uae of ample space as a mode of ‘ruth whieh, when Fist stated by sind within such fast limits... But space isnot lim ‘that the mind sequire the oes three-dimensional’.” In play in our understand + manifest Cares Howard Hinton, Now Bra of Dhoupht (London, 1888), pp. 6-1 ® Hinton, Fourth Dimension, pp. 86-87.6 LINDA DALRYMPLI HENDERSON ation of hyperspace of Teton doveloped tn noted Heaven ual tity nthe impalpable ether of space, cra. As did so many of his contempara in the fourth dimension — potential inderstood scientific pienomena ‘fourth dimension not only held Wp, Ouspensiy, Tertum Organun. The Third Canon of Thought, a Key to the Russian ed. (1916) by Claude Bragdon and 3-84; and Hinton, New Br, p- 5: Speculations om a Future "THE ‘FOURTH DIMENSION’ 1 In a passage of The Unseen Universe, also quoted by Madame Blavat- Stewart and Tait explain, ‘In fine, what we ‘wien the motions of the visible universe are hem are conveyed as by a bridge into the in- ‘male use of or stored up'” In the fourth, re model of the clairvoyance four ‘with the invisible now made vsi- As in Blavatsky’s incorporation of Stewart and Tate's discus- (along with the work of her ot ‘of Seience) that ‘eter vibrations have powers demand" could have been rephrased, substituting the meeting ‘any demand’. For Stewart and of Thermodynamics, and Hint ‘Romances, likewise drew together thermodynamics and the fourth dimen-LINDA DALRYMPLE HENDERSON s fictional writing and the fourth dimension in his stand more, Having embracing Karl du threshold of consciousness’, Brag ‘king in Paris before the First 2 the spatial fourth dimension, and Paw: wyage an pas de la quatriéme di forts. The likely source for Apol “TH FOURTH DIMENSION’ 9 noted the inadequacy of present language to describe the fourth dimension, ‘a prominent theme in Ouspensky’s philosophy as wel: thesis of our knowledge to be realized; it thoroughly ven when they appear contradictory ‘When one reacbes the county ofthe fourth dimens ever fom the notions of space nd ime, tis ‘hinks and reflects * single, absolute ings attempted to evoke @ complex, objects as think them, notLINDA DALRYM@LE HENDERSON rent with the art of Cézanne {in a higher dimension of space et- ideas on tactile aad motor Jy combining nuatiple perspectives of i space around it by means of suggesting thatthe ether itself might be the 1908 book The New Knowledge, rpatler and how much ether is, i “TE FOURTHL DIMENSION! u tho transition to ‘cosmic consciousness? and its sela- was most relevant for Malevich's evolution of So- prematison. For his Gist exhibition St Petersburg in December jaar elements 10 or i effect of moto jaton and Ouspensky emphasised as a provisional m spatial understanding. sic white expans ‘without any specific lef-right or up-dows: iiscussing the need to educate o signs of the third dimensi ‘modetied ‘Gimonsional cosmic consciousness, using concepts lang asso ‘and specific orientation, spatial “asinoss, and implied motion ~ in a new Kind of dis form Tan ig. Here the contrast to Cubism's window on an 31 world off rest pioneered by Mi ig and design in the and the Cul2 LINDA DALRYMPLB HENDERSON. the space-time world of Einstein, ‘whose works kad been underston 1on ofthe book Pawlowski added a sentence es} ‘made possible by an optic tho post-war period it was technol ‘would produce “ul- ry practical value of al symbols’, he emp union of opposites, expl ever be expressed by a mathematical “Tu TOURTHL DIMENSION’ wb Designing a New pia’ includes a section on 1, Kandinsky, Mt ry was certainly not as ete 1920s seized upon relativity to support their ‘new vision! rand political wiopias that were to be achieved by “des of Finstein, 1g the Bauhaus, Moholy had the medium of sculpture when he ‘whieh be Hlmed 1 The Light-Space Modula iy they desi foé Ramework ofthe past. Spacetime too and emotional ofrest. deeply modifice 11938: Designing @ New World (L ‘again Henderson, ‘Four Dime1 LINDA DALRYMYLE HENDERSON rmerely the privilege of exceptional fon, 8 important and as coxumon atthe back of the 1946 edition of ‘integration of | technology, science and social plannings with life’ ‘Nagy did not preach the achie th dimension as @ goal, he w ally on Bi 960s mystical literature. According to Youngblood, in the "THE FOURTH DIMENSION 15 ing sequently serve as an inspiration in the ‘whom the spatial fourth di ‘velopment of hi of ‘liquid architecture” in eyberspace ‘Novak consciously drew on the model of the dervishes of Sufi ind only by its plumbi {o transform the nature of architecture. He has continued to figure in 6 line of visionaries in twentieth-centary art and architecture who demonstrate the positive effect of utopian belief in fu- the fourth dimension. As Novak said1. Lisel6 Moholy Nagy, The Now Psion (1928), 2nd ed, New York, 1938 in One-, Two Three, and Four ligher Space (The Fourth Dimension) 2, “The Generation of Comesponding ‘Space From Claude Brag, & Pri (ochestes, NY, 1915), plViews of ath “Tessaract. ‘THE FOURTH DIMENSION MAY BE MANIFESTED: = “TO US THROUGH CERTAIN MOTIONS IN OUR, THMS 8 28ST LEDPTRATED ov CONSEERING FCT TS saeay wT ATER CE LOWLR. Pace THE Uh A, HAVING EME May be Manifested ...” From Bragdon, 4 Primer ofVig. 14. 5. Tntersetion of spiral snd e plano, from Charles Howard Hinton, The Fourth Dimension, London 1906, p. 25 6, "Xray hand of De. Vole” Published in Mustation 54 an, 1, 1896). 7.sixteen findamental ovtshedcons of the ihosatetia- Joule, Traiteélmontere dela géoméiri & quatre dimensions oil on canvas. Pushkin Picasso / clo Pic-