For 12 years, Gerald Fox accompanied the American video artist Bill Viola and his wife and artistic accomplice Kira Perron with his 16mm camera; 12 years, during which the couple struggled to conceive and make the commissioned works Martyrs and Mary, which were to be permanently installed in St Paul's Cathedral in London. During the long period in which the film is made, the British director Gerald Fox manages to capture essential moments in the artistic process of this groundbreaking video artist. Viola's basic themes – decay and genesis, birth, death and transformation – are given a new urgency when the artist unexpectedly becomes seriously ill while the film is being made.
The multiple-award-winning filmmaker Gerald Fox (born 1964) has directed more than 50 films and TV series about artists, photographers, authors, directors and musicians. Among his most famous works are Marc Quinn Making Waves (2014), Leaving Home, Coming Home: A Portrait of Robert Frank (2005) and The Fundamental Gilbert and George (1997).
