By: Anna Milavec
Abstract
Susan Hiller was a conceptual artist known for her iconic work investigating auras, alien sightings, and mystic rituals. In her art, she incorporated installation, film, painting, writing, sculpture and photography. Hiller’s intention was to research and gather together the “meaningless, the unknown, even the weird and ridiculous,” giving expression to things regarded as mystical or strange, and questioning the boundaries that normally keeps them in the shadows of the subconscious. She was heavily influenced by her background in anthropology which informed her early understanding of otherness and her analysis into how language functions as the basis of social structures. In her art, she explored themes like the nature of otherness and supernatural activity in order to make marginalized social and political others visible.
These themes are exhibited in Hiller’s installation of Witness, (2000). In the audio-sculpture, hundreds of suspended microphones, resembling flying saucers, emit clamoring voices recalling stories of alien encounters from across the world. The viewer is bombarded by the powerful testimonies demonstrating a need for belief in the possibility of a further dimension beyond the rational. Through her works of art and Witness specifically, Hiller challenges society to reconsider what they believe to be possible while inviting viewers to ponder the happenings of their subconscious.
