PLAN

Minimum of 3 DIFFERENT installations

- Lumiere brothers
- Nam June Piak
- Bill Viola
- Modern - atm
Past and current practioners of video installations
How have they used technology and techniques to install video work
What is the installation style? E.g. immersive 3D objective
What is narrative and non-narrative work form and how has the artist used it?
How the space been used, where has the work been exhibited
How does it relate to my work?
Discuss audience:
o What is the nature of the audience?
o What are their responses to the installations?

RESEARCH

http://www.magiclantern.org.uk/history/history01.php
http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2013/07/art-bill-viola
http://www.billviola.com/biograph.htm
https://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibition/project-virtually-real
https://www.somersethouse.org.uk/whats-on/bjork-digital
https://www.somersethouse.org.uk/press/bjrk-digital
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7560661-nam-june-paik
http://chestertownspy.org/2015/01/07/review-the-dreamers%E2%80%A8-at-the-academy-
art-museum-by-mary-mccoy/

The Development of Video Installations
Video installations are regarded as a modern art form but can be traced back the late 17th
century. The magic lantern is the origin of the modern slide projector. This technology
developed significantly over the next 200 years from basic projectors such as the Sturm
Lantern, that were only capable of producing small, dimly lit images. This developed into the
Triunials lantern which was produced manufactured in 1890. The Triunials lantern was
able produce huge, brightly coloured, animated entertainment and videos that were visible
to hundreds of people.
Four years later, in 1894, the Lumiere Brothers Louis and Auguste built their own recording
device called the Cinmatographe. The Cinmatographe photographed and projected film
at a speed of 16 frames per second. This was an incredible development in the film industry
as it captured what is renound as the very first motion first motion picture. This film was
entitled La Sortie des ouvriers de lusine Lumire and showed their workers leaving the
Lumire factory at the end of the day. This technology was so pioneering because it was the
first camera that could record, develop and project motion pictures. This resulted in the film
screening of their work at an industrial meeting in Paris in March 1895.
In modern day, video presentations are a part of
everyday life from internet websites to the
cinema. Similarly, to art and photography, videos
and motion pictures have become a form of art.
Video installation are a contemporary form of art
that combines video technology with installation
art. Shown in galleries, the aim of video
installations are to telling a story using of any
aspects of the surrounding environment to engage
the audience in their narrative. A pioneer within
the industry, Nam June Paik is often referred to as
the father of contemporary video art. Paik is a Korean-American artist who works
developing and experimenting with practical art. His aim is to humanize technological
experiences; connecting music, performance, sculpture, technology, video and installation.
Born in korea, Paik moved to Germany and met conceptual artists Joseph Beuys and Wolf
Vostell who inspired him to work with electronic art. Whilst living in Germany, Paik started
experimenting with mediums and technology such as televisions. His first solo exhibition
Exposition of Music-Electronic Television was displayed in 1963 at Galerie Parnass in
Wuppertal. The show featured his first manipulated televisions, made out of consumer-
grade monitors altered with magnets, degaussers and other devices to manipulate images.
Paik used nearly every room in the villa to display his prepared pianos, record and tape
installations. In the garden room, Paik set up twelve television sets, each one of them had
been distorted in different ways. This meant that the pictures from the regular program
were shown distorted and deformed, inverted or with static lines running through them. Six
of the TV sets were also manipulated by acoustic impulses. For example, one TV set was
linked to a tape recorder and another to a radio. One of the televisions could be controlled
by the voices of the audience: speaking into a microphone which generated impulses to
produce a burst of dots on screen. This created an immersive style of work that linked the
audience to the video installations. Paik continued to work on his work in this style of work
and more recently wrote a book in 2010 entitled Nam June Paik: Exposition of Music,
Electronic Television, Revisited. The book had the same title his first exhibition and
involved the modern audience in this exhibition. Those who reviewed his work through a
collection of essays and interviews as tremendous.
After living in Germany, Nam June Paik moved to New York to follow his artistic practice and
developed collaborative relationships with artists such as John Cage, Merce Cunningham
and Bill Viola. Bill Viola is an internationally recognized artists, known for his establishment
of video as a vital form of contemporary art. His work in video installations has helped to
greatly expand the possibilities in terms of technology and content. Born in 1951, Viola has
been creating videotapes for 40 years, along with other mediums such as architectural video
installations, sound environments, electronic music performances and flat panel video
pieces. Violas video installations are shown in museums and galleries worldwide. Violas
best known works is called The Dreamers. Most of his works are visual and sound
installations that all seem to have themes and ideas of birth, death, and extremes emotions.
The Dreamers is no exception. Inspired by his near-drowning experience, Viola created the
exhibition of a series of seven plasma screens, each one showing a different person
seemingly sleeping underwater. The exhibition was displayed in the basement of Blain
Southerns gallery in London. Whereas Paiks work was interactive and engaging to the
audience, Violas work was displayed so that the audience could look at his pieces
objectively. The films show the people through the water, on mounted portrait plasma
screens fixed onto the walls. Displayed in the basement, with no light, the audience is made
to feel distant and separate from the videos, just as the videos portray the feeling of being
lost, as does the audience in the darkness. His work was reviewed by multiple publications,
all of which looked at the The Dreamers in a positive light. His work, never superficial,
looked on the genius exhibition and commented on the way Viola made vision and
imagination are made tangible.
Yet the technology used in these video installations is still developing with modern
techniques. For example, at the beginning of this year, the Royal Academy of Arts worked
with virtual reality platform HTC Vive to create a pop-up project entitled Virtually Real.
Virtual reality masks are a modern way of immersing the audience in art. These artists used
software such as Kodon and Tilt Brush by Google to create this virtual reality
environment. The masks lets the audience use a palette to paint in a virtual 3D space to
produce installations that allowed visitors to move through and interact with. Youll also be
able to see their creative processes from start to finish with HTC Vives playback technology.
These ideas have been used in video exhibitions such as Bjork Digital at the end of 2016.
Held at Somerset House in London, the musical artists Bjrks collaborations with some of
the multiple visual artists to produce the exhibition. The exhibition displayed Bjorks
immersive film Black Lake. Black Lake was commissioned by the New Yorks Museum of
Modern Art, the film showed panoramic visuals of Bjork performing the first track of her
critically acclaimed album Vulnicura. Shot in the highlands of Iceland, the film for the
exhibition was created by filmmaker Andrew Thomas Huang. Huang collaborated with Bjrk
on Stonemilker VR to create a private theatrical experience for the audience using virtual
reality, and cutting edge surround-sound system to connect the artist in a unique way with
her audiences. Shot on a remote, barren beach in Iceland, the viewer is able to watch the
film in full, 360-degree VR. The responses to the exhibition were varied. Reviewer Eliza
Williams said that the headsets themselves are heavy and uncomfortable and feel
restraining and accredited this the infancy of virtual reality, but highlighted the future
potential of the technology.
Each of these exhibitions uses different forms and techniques to present their message to
the audience. For example, Bjorks exhibition uses a non-narrative form due to the singular
piece of work. A non-narrative piece of work is when the video is not presented to tell a
story to the audience. For example, a narrative can be told through the story within a video,
the transition and differences within multiple video pieces, and the way a video exhibition is
laid out. Within Bjorks work the message is shown through the music and imagery. Bill
Violas work, although, is constructed of multiple pieces all seem to provide the same
message of tranquillity and wistfulness. Yet even though it could be considered a non-
narrative exhibition, the production pieces as a whole show this idea of peace through all
ages, all races and genders. The first piece by Paik is clearly made with a narrative in mind.
The pieces, the televisions are made to show the different quality of sound and how they
interact visually with vision. Each room conveys a different message as the audience
travelled through the gallery with broken pianos and other instruments till final, sound
becomes visual aids.
These ideas are all used to for a specific purpose. For example, my production looks at the
social issues of cancer and how the charity Williams Fund challenges these ideas. Similarly,
to Violas piece I will considering screen to display my work. This will show the production in
high details. To keep the focus of the audience and create emotion, I will use headphones
for that the viewer feels a sense of singularity and intimacy between the narrative of the
production as well as those who are interviewed.