Nineteenth International Conference on the Arts in Society

Abstract

The concept of “station” has two meanings in common parlance: either just the building where passengers stop, or the complex consisting of several buildings with strictly functional functions - passenger station, goods station, control tower, water tank, open and closed platforms, toilets - or commercial - station hotel, station café, various shops, other facilities. In some cases, the concept also includes urban aspects - the street, the market or the station area. This ‘variety’ of the scope of the concept is mainly explained by the fact that the railway station is usually an urban centre of interest, creating economic and commercial activity around it that meets the requirements generated by rail transport, which at city level means ‘boosting urbanity’. As a rule, the names used for rail activity were naturally adopted from the water transport sphere, moving from ‘land port’, ‘embarkation point’ or ‘disembarkation point’, ‘platform’, to the expression ‘station’, which originally meant the possibility of parking ships.” Whatever the architectural style, whatever the size of the building, railway station architecture is evoked in all the arts, and it in turn facilitates the evolution of the arts further on in history. Thus, as this paper explores, it is only through the artistic expression of these buildings that we can override concepts such as space and time and transcend into moments captured with great skill by architects, painters, directors, actors, dancers, screenwriters, playwrights, writers, sculptors, and musicians.