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Bill Viola - LIFE DEATH REBIRTH ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARTS JANUARY 26, 2019 - MARCH 31, 2019

This exhibition brings together two artists – born centuries apart – who explore the same universal themes with works of transcendent beauty and raw emotional power.

Bill Viola, Nantes Triptych, 1992. Three-channel colour video triptych, free text 3.2 x 2.3m, 3.2 x 4m, 3.2 x 2.3m, duration 00:29:46. Courtesy Bill Viola Studio.

In 2006, pioneering video artist Bill Viola saw the finest of a collection of these drawings at Windsor Castle, and was astonished by the Renaissance master’s expressive use of the body to convey emotional and spiritual states. Although created in a radically different medium, Viola’s own works also grapple with life’s fundamental questions, asking us to consider the thresholds between birth, life and death. Both artists harness the symbolic power of sacred art, and both show us physical extremes and moments of transcendence.





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