Bill Viola Video Quotations

The fundamental aspect of video is not the image, even though you can stand in amazement at what can be done electronically, how images can be manipulated and the really extraordinary creative possibilities. For me the essential basis of video is the movement - something that exists at the moment and changes in the next moment.

I came of age at the end of the 1960s, just when video was also coming into the world. Companies such as Sony and Panasonic were starting to market it and we artists immediately knew how it could be used.

Video artists being at the low end of the totem pole economically, one of the ways we survive is to go around showing work and giving these talks.

The very first video experience I had was in high school. They brought a black-and-white closed-circuit surveillance camera into the classroom. I will never forget, as a kid, looking at that image.