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VIA CRUCIS EXITATIONS (with John Alderman) is part of a larger, continuing exploration of contemporary existential themes that uses a religious frame as a starting point for a secular reflection on the spiritual, political, sociological, ecological, and technological. It hopes to draw out, examine, and transform the mythic aspects of its subjects in crisis, a sort of modern alchemy for our desperate times as technology shapes our perception of the real and the symbolic in a pervasive feedback loop.
Through brute force and cunning invention that humanity has taken dominion of the earth. Over the centuries this same force has progressively permeated deeper aspects of our lives, imperceptibly supplanting the roles of religion and philosophy in structuring our understanding of existence. What was from the realm of faith has shifted toward what is perceived as reality, whether it is artificial or synthetic..
Via Crucis unfolds as a trial that confronts humanity with our deeds. Relationships to the non-human, the environment, wealth, consumption, each other and ourselves, are explored in 12 one-minute clips. Commonplace schemes, disruptions, sins, evils, myths, divinities, saviors, curses, punishments, redemptions, and transfigurations are invoked in a perpetual cycle of testimony.
The project’s mediums carry the same afflictions as their subjects, and so this is their trial, too. Fragmented imagery, sound, and texts create a familiar but distorted, uncanny valley of examination, memory, and revision. Today’s representations, whether as advertising, entertainment, news, science, or personal images, dynamically emerge from systems beyond our physical and conceptual grasp. Via Crucis mirrors the accumulations of our iconosphere, incorporating images that are seen and revisited, unnoticed, or transformed. These scenes encapsulate our daily dramas but tie them unflinchingly to their broad context and impact, in an unrelenting, existential trial, a countdown to both self-terminations and regenerative transformations.
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