Submerged-Spaces: Bill Viola - Press information

5th May 2012 - 29th Jul 2012

The exhibition brings the work of internationally celebrated video artist Bill Viola to East Anglia for the first time in three venues across Norwich: the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, the Crypt of the Carnary Chapel at Norwich School and the Undercroft beneath the Memorial Garden. The exhibition runs until Sunday 29 July.

Ascension, 2000 Bill Viola Read more »

Bill Viola is one of the world’s most celebrated video artists. His mesmerising installations explore such fundamental experiences as birth, death and the meaning of human consciousness. Viola has exhibited in galleries and museums across the world, creating works that act with the viewing space to create intimate encounters that envelop the viewer.

This major, city-wide exhibition demonstrates Viola’s mastery of working practice over the last decade, bringing together monumental and intimate pieces displayed in three underground locations, creating a unique way of experiencing the works.

Professor Paul Greenhalgh, Director of the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, said: “Bill Viola is one of the most important artists of the last fifty years. The visual and symbolic intensity of these moving tapestries of light embody a beautiful contradiction: that they operate simultaneously in time, and outside of time.”

The Lower Gallery of the Sainsbury Centre is transformed into a meditative space with rooms dedicated to a set of four works: Four Hands (2001), Catherine’s Room (2001), Surrender (2001) and the spectacular Ascension (2000). Two further installations are displayed at city-centre venues never before open to the public, inviting visitors to leave the city behind and immerse themselves in the work. The Carnary Chapel, situated at Norwich School within the Cathedral Close, hosts Visitation (2008), while the final work, The Quintet of the Unseen (2000), is installed at the Undercroft, situated beneath the Memorial Garden opposite City Hall.