EASTON, MD.- The Academy Art Museum in Easton, MD, opened a new exhibition on December 6, “Bill Viola: The Dreamers” in its Healy Gallery. The exhibition will be on display through March 1, 2015 with curator tours on both Friday, January 30 and Tuesday, February 24 at 12 noon each day.

Bill Viola (b. 1951) is internationally recognized as one of today’s leading artists. He has been instrumental in the establishment of video as a vital form of contemporary art and in so doing has helped to greatly expand its scope in terms of technology, content, and historical reach. For over 40 years he has created architectural video installations, video films, sound environments, electronic music performances, flat panel video pieces, as well as works for television broadcast, concerts, opera, and sacred spaces.

Viola’s video installation – total environments that envelop the viewer in image and sound – employ state-of-the-art technologies and are distinguished by their precision and direct simplicity. Viola uses video to explore the phenomena of sense perception as an avenue to self-knowledge. His works focus on universal human experiences—birth, death, the unfolding of consciousness—and have roots in both Eastern and Western art as well as spiritual traditions, including Zen Buddhism, Islamic Sufism, and Christian mysticism. Using the inner language of subjective thoughts and collective memories, his videos communicate to a wide audience, allowing viewers to experience the work directly and in their own personal way. Bill Viola and Kira Perov, his wife and long-time collaborator, live and work in Long Beach, CA.