Review: Bill Viola's Mary • by Francesca Valente 1

Hamilton Arts & Letters     The video installation entitled “Mary” by renowned American artist Bill Viola was unveiled last September at Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London. The event is the crowning point of a very demanding project on the mysteries of life and death which started with “Martyrs” (Earth, Air, Fire, Water) exhibited in 2003 at the National Gallery in London and now installed in the right naive of the Cathedral. The two works are a gift of the artist to Tate Modern and represent the first time in Great Britain in which video installations are permanently exhibited in a church. Mary interpreted by Alessia Patregnani represents the journey of a modern woman who, throughout the four seasons, is suspended between fear and hope waiting to give birth. The narration, alternatively, is based on micro-stories (reminiscent of Giotto and Piero della Francesca’s frescoes) and macro-images of great intensity. The fire which, in a winter night with a full moon, lights up Mary’s face and womb, dissolves at last into the sepulchral whiteness of the Son in the final embrace of the Mother who caresses him and incredulously accepts his Passion and Death.   [  >>>>>  FORWARD ]   [Distillate © HA&L + Francesca Valente {from the Greek bios} -- the course of a life.]