Bender_SPF10_Research: Artist post # 6 October 18, 2010 Bill Viola

Artist post # 6 October 18, 2010
Bill Viola

why:
I am currently interested in sound art. Because I am not very aware of sound art or what makes sound art "good" or even considerable sound art I am just investigating artists and work in the genre. Bill Viola seems to be fairly recongnizable in the sound art community.
Artist Biography:
According to Violas webpage he " is internationally recognized as one of today’s leading artists. He has been instrumental in the establishment of video as a vital form of contemporary art, and in so doing has helped to greatly expand its scope in terms of technology, content, and historical reach. For over 35 years he has created videotapes, architectural video installations, sound environments, electronic music performances, flat panel video pieces, and works for television broadcast. Viola’s video installations—total environments that envelop the viewer in image and sound—employ state-of-the-art technologies and are distinguished by their precision and direct simplicity. They are shown in museums and galleries worldwide and are found in many distinguished collections."

I really enjoyed how he had "Captain of the “TV Squad,” 5th grade, P.S. 20, Queens, New York, 1960" in his list of cureers.

Quote 1 - Sorry this is a long Quote but I really value at the end of the end paragraph describing different forms or media Viola uses. As well as how intimate Viola talks about his experience with something we all can relate to.

"Video artist Bill Viola first came to Death Valley with a friend in 1973. A child of the green summers and freezing winters of New York, he had just graduated from university. He was 21, a student of religions. He stood in the middle of a salt flat, simultaneously inconsequential and enveloping, and felt his horizons extend.

"For the first time in my life I felt like my senses were liberated," he remembers. "I felt completely open. I felt part of me was going out that hundred miles to the mountain range and encompassing that whole thing. I get goosebumps just thinking about it.

"At a certain point I became frightened. I felt like the landscape was so vast, if I got lost out here, they would never find me. And God could come down and [as if I was] a little bug, just flick me away.

"And those two realisations: that you are connected deeply to the entire cosmos and at the same time you are mortal and you are fragile and inconsequential; the search for meaning that human beings have been engaged with since the beginning of time is part of the reconciliation of those two things."

There is the landscape, there is imagination and the greatest works of the greatest painters of our time. Connecting them is Bill Viola, his video camera and a flickering image on the wall of a museum, art gallery, church or even a handheld communications device with a screen the size of a matchbox - each of them, at various times, the medium through which his work appears."

"Liberation of the Senses - Arts - Entertainment - Smh.com.au." Sydney Morning Herald - Business & World News Australia | Smh.com.au. Web. 18 Oct. 2010. <http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/04/04/1207249434840.html>.

Quote 2 - I have taken this quote from an interview, " do you have any advice for young artists?

my advice for the young video artists is to make sure you take
the lens cap off the camera before you push the button.
because I didn't do this all the time. also to learn from the
camera, you must keep your eye open without judgment.
cameras do not make judgments. they receive all the light equally
and we have to keep our minds and hearts open to be
completely objective, feeling everything equally good and bad,
violent and peaceful, light and dark. all opposites are necessary
for life and so you shouldn't make a value judgment on what
you are experiencing. video can teach us how to see with an
open eye."

"bill viola - interview with the us video artist." designboom. june 9th, 2007., june 9th, 2007.. Web. 17 Oct 2010. <http://www.designboom.com/eng/interview/viola.html>.