Bill Viola - Martyrs

Bill Viola's piece, The Martyrs, is a piece designed for St. Paul's Cathedral in London, as a permanent exhibit. The piece is four screens, placed vertically together, each showing a looped silent video, which are each just over seven minutes long. They all show 'a person undergoing a highly aestheticized ordeal involving, respectively, earth, air, fire, and water—all captured with sumptuous visual effects and all withstood in serene and saintly forbearance.' (Willis, 2014, http://www.nybooks.com)

These videos are beautiful to look at, watching each model going through a different ordeal, however, resulting in the same conclusion. When you watch these videos, you notice they all end with the same calming result, of them accepting the fate they have been faced with. 'The man doused in water is slowly raised up into the light. The other three just raise their eyes with restful looks on their faces.' (Willis, 2014, http://www.nybooks.com)

The way these videos have been shot, with the lighting and effects just adds to how mesmerizing the images displayed on these screens are. 'Viola is the venerable master of a video art that has long since transcended its own technology. All of his trademarks are on display at St Paul's – ultra slow-mo, cinematic lighting, bodies under extreme pressure, ascending and descending, in motion and at rest, a beautiful use of silver, blue and white against velvety darkness; above all, as direct an appeal to the heart as the mind.' (Cumming, 2014, http://www.theguardian.com)

As you look at these images, you can feel a sense that they fit in well, even surrounded by all the classical religious paintings, they seem to compliment each other, though being at opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to the methods of creation. 'Like the paintings around it, it functions both as a work of art – violent yet graceful – and an object of contemplation.' (Cumming, 2014, http://www.theguardian.com)

Overall, these pieces are amazingly designed, working beautifully within the environment they were created for. 

Bill Viola, Martyrs (Earth, Air, Fire, Water), 2014.

Bibliography: 

Willis, Simon (2014), Bill Viola’s Martyrs: Sleek, Glamorous, Empty [Online]

Available at: http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/gallery/2014/jun/20/bill-viola-martyrs-sleek-glamorous-empty/ (Accessed 23/09/14)

Cumming, Laura (2014), Bill Viola: Martyrs review – let the unbelievers come [Online] The Guardian.

Available at: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/may/25/bill-viola-martyrs-review-let-the-unbelievers-come (Accessed 23/09/14)

Fig. 1, Bill Viola, Martyrs (Earth, Air, Fire, Water), 2014 [Online] http://www.billviola.com/ (Accessed 23/09/14)