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Accordingly to the neuro scientific
principle, the so-called ”mirror mechanism”, a similar emotional
reaction gets triggered in a person’s brain in both cases, when he
experiences something in first person or if he sees somebody else experiencing
it. The same emotional transfer happens with art that in turn represents
human emotions, such as the work of Bill Viola. Observance is part
of a series of video works entitled The Passions. As in other previous
works, Viola presents a choreography of contemporary characters performing
scenes from the classic Christian iconography. The figures are extrapolated
from religious symbology and re-contextualized in a timeless and universally
poetic dimension as a metaphor of the essence of the human condition. Observance
draws inspiration from Albrecht Dürer’s Die vier Apostel
(1526), an altarpiece depicting the grief of the four apostles over the
death of Christ. The theme or virtual object of Viola’s video is again
the physical expression of grief. The characters enter and exit the performance
space with their eyes fixed on a set point that remains hidden, placed out
of sight, in the spectator’s space by the artist. Some of the characters
occasionally look towards the spectator, as though in search of understanding,
while others remains inwardly focused. As in previous works, Viola shows
the entire action in ”slow motion”, prompting the spectator
to enter gradually into the details of the characters’ gestures and
mimetic expression. In neuroscientific terms, Viola’s work is a perfect
example of the arousal of empathy through visual impact and the triggering
of mirror neurons (Rizzolatti), and hence an experience at one remove from
the spectator, like an involuntary act of ”mimesis”. |
