Pietu Pietiäinen & Juha Valkeapää: The Truth
The Truth is an oracle-like entity that people visit in order to learn truth. To enter the room of the oracle, the visitors are asked to answer one question: “What is the truth?”, by writing the answer on a desktop computer. The languages used can vary depending on where the work is presented. We learn that truth is relative.
The Truth is an interactive installation, in which viewers are invited to share their truths with an oracle.
The truths that people write in any selected language for the oracle are randomly read aloud by the low-pitch computer voice. The projection light cone reacts to sound and becomes both the eye and the mouth of the oracle.
The installation is inspired, alongside various oracle legends, by the horn of Archangel Gabriel in which she would blow on the Armageddon day. The conelike shape of the projection of the entity’s speaking mouth reminds also of the geometric figure, named after the same legend “Gabriel’s Horn” which is a known mathematical paradox with infinite surface area but finite volume. Other influences include the mystical Roman marble piece “La Bocca della Verità” (The Mouth of Truth) and the “Pure Sculpture” works by Anthony McCall.
The Truth is a speaking, moving mouth or an eye, forming a deep, hypnotic three-dimensional tunnel in a dark space that is filled with harmless theatre hazer smoke. The random truths will be triggered when a spectator approaches the breathing light in the dark space. The optimal point for receiving the truth is in the centre of the projection cone, along the centre line of the room.
At all exhibition times the work requires an attendant who is showing the audience their way in and out the dark room and controlling the right amount of hazer smoke as well as people in the space. The same person will guide the audience to answer the question before entering the installation.
