I'm really excited by this new project of experimental media, it's something i've never tried before and eager to learn and create different pieces.
One video we watched was by now second year students; Natalie, Preston, Artur, and TJ. Called
Lost and found, their aim was to create a video only made from objects they have found. After a few issues they decided to look through the rubbish bins of charity shops, they found lots of interesting things such as old post cards and VHS tapes.
The rushes they did film was from the camera looking up at a piece of glass which filmed objects related to the moving images from the tapes.
I really liked this because it was an interesting approach to lost memories. I also found it sad that all these pieces of memories which was important to someone ended up in the bin of a charity shop.
Bill Viola
Art has been around for centuries, and comes in many different forms, from cave paintings, to mosaics, to statues, and portraits, emerging during the 1970s; Installation art is associated with Conceptual art and can consequently be traced back to artists such as ‘Marcel Duchamp’ and his modernist ready-mades such as his controversial urinal called ‘Fountain’.
Bill Viola born in 1951 is a contemporary artist, deliberated as one of the most celebrated promoters of video art. His work focuses on the idea behind necessary human experiences such as birth, death and characteristics of consciousness.
At the age of six on holiday with his family, he nearly drowned in a lake, an experience he describes as “… the most beautiful world I’ve ever seen in my life” and “without fear,” and “peaceful”. We inevitably make a connection with this traumatic event which he interprets as a wonderful experience and the prominence of water in his work.
Bill Viola is internationally recognised as one of the most important artists working in video today. His work often seeks to give tangible visual form to abstract psychological and metaphysical experiences.
Viola has been making video art for 40 years and received his BFA in Experimental Studios from Syracuse University in 1973.
His most recent work which is now on permanent display in St Paul’s cathedral in London. His new piece is called ‘Martyrs’ which is four moving images of four flat screen monitors. ‘Martyrs’ shows the natural elements, Earth, fire, wind, and water. ‘Martyrs’ show four individuals being martyred. The work has no sound. It lasts for seven minutes.
The location of the piece predisposes the audience to consider the spiritual element, the religious side of the piece shows the punishment poses suffering for a religious cause.
Martyrs will be joined in 2016 by a second piece entitled ‘Mary’.
Viola said “As the work opens, four individuals are shown in stasis, a pause from their suffering. Gradually there is movement in each scene as an element of nature begins to disturb their stillness. Flames rain down, winds begin to lash, water cascades, and earth flies up. As the elements rage, each martyr’s resolve remains unchanged. In their most violent assault, the elements represent the darkest hour of the martyr’s passage through death into the light.”
It has taken more than a decade to agree, plan, and instal Violas ‘Martrys’ which started when then cathedrals oveerssers were struck by his exhibition ‘The Passion’ at the national gallery in 2003. [1]
The ‘fall into Paradise’ is part of The Tristan Project, a series inspired by Wagner’s opera, Tristan and Isolde. These two renowned lovers experienced such depth of feeling that the physical world became unbearable for them. Their love simply could no longer be restricted in flesh and blood and their spirits drift into the void lastly exploding into a new space.
Many of Viola’s recent works visualise some kind of almost violent transformation or transition from material to spiritual form.
Two other works in The Tristan Project – Fire Woman and Tristan’s Ascension (The Sound of a Mountain under a Waterfall) 2005.
[1]
http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/may/21/bill-viola-matryr-video-installation-st-pauls
http://www.billviola.com/biograph.htm
