Bill Viola was among the first contemporary artists to not only integrate video technology into his artistic language but also to explore its expressive potential and push its boundaries over the decades. In his work, he used evolving technologies to probe the depths of human emotion and spirituality. Until the end of 2025, two venues in Toruń – the Centre of Contemporary Art Znaki Czasu and the Tumult Foundation exhibition space – will host an extensive retrospective of this American new media pioneer.
Entitled Visions of Time and organised on the first anniversary of the artist’s death, the exhibition, curated by Kira Perov and Marek Żydowicz, presents several dozen works offering a comprehensive overview of Viola’s oeuvre – from experimental, groundbreaking pieces of the 1970s to the monumental works of his later years.
Kira Perov, Viola’s long-time collaborator, life partner, and co-curator of the Toruń exhibition, speaks to us about his legacy, creative philosophy, and the enduring relevance of Visions of Time.
“Bill’s work is deeply connected with his manipulation of time. Once you alter time, you step into another world.”
— Kira Perov
Kuba Żary: A good place to begin a conversation about such a vast presentation might be its title. What does The Visions of Time mean to you, and how does it shape the idea of the exhibition?
Kira Perov: Bill’s work is deeply connected with his manipulation of time. Once you alter time, you step into another world. If you slow something down long enough, you begin to see the essence of what you’re observing. At the same time, it allows the viewer to slow down as well – to drift into introspection. Bill’s images lead you toward the actions they depict, but they also invite reflection. We used to say that with these works we offer the viewer a gift of time – time they wouldn’t normally give themselves.
Today, slowing down moving images has become almost conventional in new media art, but when Bill first began doing it, it was entirely new. Yet it wasn’t novelty that interested him – he simply wanted to reveal things in a different way, to show what usually remains unseen.
K.Ż.: As you’ve mentioned, the techniques pioneered by Bill have now become part of the language of new media art. Not only artists but also audiences are very familiar with them. Has that changed how his works are received today?
K.P.: The reaction is essentially the same. When people enter the exhibition, they are respectful, attentive, and drawn into the work. And they’re quiet – everyone becomes so quiet. The slow motion pulls you in; you want to understand what’s happening, why it feels this way. Even with the more demanding pieces, people stay, silently watching. That’s been true for many years. What changes is the individual experience – someone may feel compelled to return to one particular work, another to a different one, each finding what they need.
After 9/11, when the Twin Towers collapsed, the whole world was in shock – especially New Yorkers, devastated and grieving. It was a moment of collective mourning. At that time, the Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibited one of Bill’s works from The Passions series, The Quintet of Remembrance (2000). These intimate, slow-motion portraits capture emotions unfolding almost imperceptibly. Many people came to see that piece because they were seeking healing. And that is when art reveals its function.
Art is functional. Everyone has a painting they return to – one that always offers something: pleasure, comfort, a sense of grounding. Bill’s work has that quality. I don’t mean to criticise artists like Jeff Koons, but I don’t think his work evokes that kind of feeling. His register is different – ironic, even cynical – which has its place too. But what Bill and I tried to do was something else: to create work that offers people a chance to pause, to reflect, and perhaps understand a little more about themselves.
K.Ż.: Bill’s art is often described as research-based – drawing on technical innovations, classical art, philosophy, wide-ranging intellectual and spiritual inspirations… Yet from what you’re describing, it seems primarily grounded in emotional experience.
K.P.: It’s definitely both. Most pieces, though rooted in emotion, explore it through intellectual concepts, scientific formulas, or technological structures.
For instance, the works in the Passions series, which I’ve mentioned, are studies of feelings – Bill wanted to understand what emotion is and how far it can be stretched. One particular work from this series, Anima (2000), is a triptych, portraits of two women and one man. We filmed it using a special camera that records 300 frames per second instead of the usual 28 – cameras developed for commercials, to capture things like milk pouring into a glass or a bullet frozen in flight. Each person was filmed separately for one minute, during which the camera consumed 1000 feet of film. Bill wondered: How far can I stretch an emotion before it dissolves? In the edit room, that one minute became eighty minutes of video. It’s astonishing to watch – so slow that you can’t perceive the movement, like the small hand of a clock. You don’t notice it shifting, but when you look again, time has passed. Sometimes you only see it when someone blinks; otherwise, suddenly, the expression has changed. It’s mesmerising.
Another example is Interval (1995), first shown in the US Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. The installation consists of two parallel walls. On one, you see a naked man in what looks like an old, tiled bathhouse, slowly washing his body. On the opposite wall, a rapid, violent montage unfolds – but the two projections never appear simultaneously. Bill used a mathematical formula to structure the sequence: first 15 seconds of calm, then 15 of violence; then 10 and 10, 5 and 5. The intervals shrink exponentially until the rhythm becomes unbearable, then everything stops – only to begin again. It’s a battle between the internal and the external, endlessly unresolved.
Bill was always fascinated by new ideas and developments and used them as part of his artistic palette. When computer editing systems first appeared in the early 1980s, we were in Japan, working at the Sony studios where the technology was being developed. The editing console allowed a tactile, almost human control: you could speed something up or slow it down smoothly, by hand, not just by pressing buttons. Bill immediately turned that into a piece. But the technology itself was not enough; it was never enough. He read widely – ancient religious texts, Christian mysticism, Sufism, and Japanese Buddhism. Living in Japan for a year and a half, we absorbed not only the visual culture but also the sensibility – a way of perceiving time, space, and presence.
It was not unlike the period he spent a year and a half in Florence in the mid-1970s – the immersion in the Renaissance city had a profound impact on him. He became fascinated by the acoustics of its cathedrals, recording sounds and hearing things he had never encountered before. His sources were endless, truly.
K.Ż.: Do you know where this lively mind and constant curiosity came from? What was Bill searching for?
K.P.: There are no answers. But you have to keep searching, keep looking. If you look in the right places, you might find something – but never the answer. Bill’s work never offered answers; it always raised questions. He used to say that today’s artist works with invisible things. Everything visible has already been mapped by National Geographic – but they don’t look in the right places; they only replicate what’s in front of them.
The world today is saturated with images; it’s a very confusing time for images. You could spend your whole life staring at your phone and never really notice anything else.
“He used to say that today’s artist works with invisible things. Everything visible has already been mapped by National Geographic – but they don’t look in the right places; they only replicate what’s in front of them.”
— Kira Perov
K.Ż.: What should we definitely notice in the Toruń exhibition – what shouldn’t we miss? With such a vast presentation, visitors might sometimes feel overwhelmed, unable to take everything in at once. It may be easier to focus on a section, on a single piece. So if I asked you to choose just one work here – one piece you’d return to – which would it be, and why?
K.P.: That’s almost impossible, because the exhibition is designed as a journey. If you only see one piece, you lose that sense of progression. But I do love The Messenger (1996), which we’re showing at the Centre of Contemporary Art. It was originally created for Durham Cathedral in northeast England, which is a thousand years old. The image shows a naked man underwater, slowly moving backwards, shrinking in the frame, holding his breath the entire time. The footage is, of course, slowed down, so it feels as if he’s holding his breath endlessly. Then, very gradually, he moves forward again. Bubbles escape from his mouth, he fills the frame once more, and finally takes a huge breath – exhaling with great force. The sound is loud, almost shocking, compared to the gentle water sounds heard before.
After pausing to recover, he inhales again, powerfully, and once more sinks back, always facing us. It’s a gorgeous piece – visually stunning, emotionally striking. And you can imagine what the Church of England thought of showing a naked man in a cathedral… but they loved it. For them, the work clearly speaks of the brevity of life: our time on Earth is just one breath in and out – and then we return again. It’s a deeply powerful piece.
At the Tumult Foundation, we’re also showing another work, Inverted Birth (2014) – essentially Bill’s last major piece. Like much of his work, it deals with birth, death, and rebirth. But this time, it unfolds in reverse, transforming darkness into light. It’s not a work one can fully describe – it must be experienced. It’s short, but immensely powerful.
And the spaces themselves are very different. One is a contemporary art centre; the other is housed in a building not originally meant for art. Going downstairs into the lower floor, part of the old City Hall, you feel the weight of history. The works resonate differently there.
K.Ż.: Part of the exhibition is also presented in the Centre of Contemporary Art’s screening room – essentially a cinema. Often, the division between video art and film seems strict: either you’re an artist who shows work in galleries, or you’re a filmmaker presenting in cinemas. Are we now at a moment when those lines are blurring – when works like Bill’s belong equally to the visual arts and the cinematic experience?
K.P.: Oh, that’s an interesting question – no one has ever asked me that before. I think the difference lies mainly in the environment: in a gallery, you’re in an immersive situation, surrounded by an installation; in a theatre, you’re observing. But the experience can be similar, even similarly narrative. When Bill began a new video piece, he knew the kind of ideas he wanted to express, but not yet how. He would spend hours in coffee shops, writing notes and texts. I always knew he was getting close when he started making lists – shot lists of images or ideas. That’s when the work began to crystallise. Each project had its own list, its own logic. So there is a narrative, but it lies in the selection and sequence of images – that’s the most important thing.
The cinema context is yet another reminder that you should really take in the whole narration that is an exhibition. Think about it – people go to the movies, sit for two hours, and that’s fine, even if they’ve seen the film before. But with an art exhibition, there’s a tendency to rush through and say, I’ve seen everything. Here, you can’t really do that.
K.Ż.: So your recommendation is to take the whole journey, no shortcuts.
K.P.: Exactly. But not all at once. The best way to experience this exhibition is to come back two or three times. I recommend several visits, if possible. Only then can you truly take your time – and truly see and feel. To end with a small quote from Bill: Art is, for me, the process of waking up the soul.
“Each project had its own list, its own logic. So there is a narrative, but it lies in the selection and sequence of images – that’s the most important thing.”
— Kira Perov
Bill Viola: Visions of Time / Wizje czasu
June 25–December 31, 2025
CSW Znaki czasu in Toruń
