Five walls, one soul: Bill Viola turns a gallery into your existential crisis.
The film is a five-part projection-based installation, which addresses the complexity of human existence through the themes of individuality, society, death and rebirth. Each video is projected directly onto the wall of the exhibition space, just as paint from a fresco adheres to the surface of a plaster wall.
Direction
Viola's video-fresco technique melts time into architecture.
Cinematography
Underwater baptism shots that drown you in beauty.
Sound
Aural landscapes that replace your heartbeat temporarily.
Director
Bill Viola
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
The title references the Egyptian Book of the Dead, specifically spells guiding souls through the afterlife—Viola literally updated 3,000-year-old funeral technology.
Each segment was shot at different global locations then composited to feel like one continuous dreamscape; the 'fresco' projection method was developed specifically so the image couldn't exist without the wall.
US
