Sodium Vapor (including Constellation and Oracle)
Bill Viola
1979, released 1986, 15:14 min, color, sound
Sodium Vapor (including Constellation and Oracle)
Bill Viola
1979, released 1986, 15:14 min, color, sound
Description
Writes Viola: "Sodium Vapor was recorded over a period of several weeks in the hours between one and five in the morning on the streets of an industrial area in lower Manhattan. The title derives from an interest in the particular qualities of sodium vapor street lighting — its characteristic color temperature, the shadows it casts, and the eerie quality it seems to impart to the objects it illuminates. The essence of the work is the spell which the hour has over the physical spaces of the streets in the early morning. There is always the unseen presence of the large number of people surrounding you, most of them sleeping; the camera is awake in their dreamtime. The recording of these locations in the middle of the night rather than in daylight represents a transformation — like figure/ground reversal — of these physical spaces from the familiar thoughts and activities of the day to the nighttime shadows of emptiness and obscurity."
Production Assistant/Still Photographer: Kira Perov. Produced in association with the TV Lab at WNET/Thirteen and the Artists' Television Workshop at WXXI/TV.
Exhibition & Distribution Conditions
SCREENING REQUIREMENTS for museum or gallery presentation:
The video should be presented as cinema. Projection in a dedicated, darkened gallery is strongly preferred. Accompanying floor plans and technical specifications regarding projection equipment is appreciated. Videos must be shown in original 4:3 aspect ratio, either using projector settings, as available, or pillarboxed with black masking.
Seating must be provided for the audience, and works must be shown according to a published schedule, not presented as an automatically repeating loop. Works cannot be incorporated into looping programs with other titles. Audio must be handled through a separate stereo sound system (amplifier and two speakers).
Please contact the EAI office (info@eai.org) for further information regarding monitor displays. Presentation on monitor may be permitted in certain instances, but the use of headphones or sound through built-in speakers is not permitted.
