| video portraits by Robert Wilson
commissioned and produced by
VOOM HD Networks
an exhibition created by
Change Performing Arts
Spoleto 51 has opened to a three-year collaboration with Robert Wilson, thanks to which the artist will present a special series of VOOM Portraits in an installation purposely planned by Palazzo Leti Sansi opening hours - 6 July, 11.00 am - 8.00 pm;
- 7, 8 and 9 July, 4.00 pm - 8.00 pm;
- 10 and 11 July, 4.00 pm - 10.00 pm;
- 12 July, 11.00 am - 10.00 pm;
- 13 July, 11.00 am - 5.00 pm; | During the mid 70s, Robert Wilson started experimenting a video-portrait creating a series of 100 episodes of 30 seconds each, known as Video 50.In 2007, after two years of collaboration with VOOM HD Networks, a pioneering company in HD television technologies, VOOM Portraits comes to life, a series of more than 60 video-portraits in high-definition that portray protagonists of the star system, common people and extraordinary animals. Among others, the VOOM Portraits have portrayed Brad Pitt, Winona Ryder, Johnny Depp, the Princess of Monaco, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Robert Downey, Juliette Binoche, Isabelle Huppert, Isabella Rossellini, Jeanne Moreau, Steve Buscemi, Alan Cumming, Willem Dafoe, Dita von Teese, but even the worldwide champ of sumo, an automobile mechanic, frogs, porcupines, and panthers. Obviously, technology is a fundamental issue in the realization of these 21st century portraits for the pureness of the images. Through a sophisticated system of repetition, the portraits can be screened in an endless loop, whether exhibited in a museum, in a public venue, or in a collector’s home. Each portrait is a piece of art developed by Wilson in collaboration with the subject and is inspired by movies, art, and historical happenings, and creates a series of “one-act plays” thanks to which Winona Ryder, for example, is Winnie in Beckett’s Happy Days, Caroline of Monaco recalls her mother – Grace Kelly – in Rear Window, Isabelle Huppert is Greta Garbo…
The VOOM Portraits at first glance could seem to be traditionally static portraits but then the characters make a tiny gesture – like batting an eyelid, or moving a foot – and the perceptive experience changes radically. The portraits are accompanied by a soundtrack created for the occasion by musicians such as Lou Reed, Tom Waits, Bernard Hermann, Michael Galasso, Big Black, Bach revisited by Glenn Gould, Hans Peter Kuhn and Ethel Merman. |
