Prophecy and Memory: Wavelength as Architectural Drawing

'Wavelength' (1967), by Canadian artist Michael Snow, is a study of temporality and its recording; these are characteristic, repeating themes in Snow's work, and in the work of other structural/ materialist filmmakers. This paper will assert that this film also operates as a study of space and generates a construction of space in the active mind of the viewer, in a manner similar to that of architectural drawing. The architectural drawing depicts a subject that does not yet exist, and as such operates prophetically, in a temporal direction reverse to that of conventional representation. It is in the reading of architectural drawing by the active viewer that its subject comes into existence. This paper will analyze Wavelength as architectural drawing and consider the implications for architectural representation - the structural film may provide a method for the recording of spatiotemporal architectural concerns, offering the practice of architectural drawing methods for documenting time as well as space. The paper will refer to critical theory surrounding the production of structural/materialist film work and identify potential correspondences between this theoretical discourse and that surrounding architectural drawing.