The Veiling is one of five video and sound installations that Bill Viola produced to occupy the five rooms of the US Pavilion during the 46th Venice Biennale in 1995. Through a collaboration with The Fabric Workshop and Museum, Viola created a system of nine sheer scrims that catch the light from two video projections. Images of a man and a woman can be seen slowly walking toward each other, passing through the scrims, and merging at the center before moving apart again. This ghostly action, repeating over and over, becomes hypnotic. Like much of Viola’s work, The Veiling has a dreamlike quality and suggests the multiplicity of experience that exists both in our own thoughts and our understanding of our interaction with another human being.
This installation is being presented as part of a larger survey of works by the pioneering American video artist also on view at the Barnes Foundation. Organized for the Barnes by guest curator John G. Hanhardt, I Do Not Know What I Am Like: The Art of Bill Viola, on view June 30 through September 15, 2019, is the first-large scale exhibition of Viola’s work to be presented in Philadelphia.