Mark Boulos

Mark Boulos tests the possibilities for documenting what is not visual. During a recent exhibition at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, the American artist presented three video installations focusing on the manifestation of religious, political, and economic ideologies. 

In the single-channel video projection, The Word Was God (2007), the religious beliefs of two Christian communities are expressed through language. The Shiloh Pentecostal Church members pray until they speak in tongues; their collective volume contrasts sharply with the quiet of a man living alone in the Syrian desert (a contrast unfortunately lost when sound from the next video spills into the room). This man speaks Aramaic, the language that Jesus spoke, while the Pentecostalists believe that only God can understand their tongues. Boulos subtly extends this consideration of language to include physical expressions when he highlights the Pentecostalists rocking, lying in pews, and spontaneously clapping.