Susan Hiller

Like the ex-anthropologist she is, Hiller has coolly observed the hysterical terrain of our culture’s paranoid imagination. “Wild Talents” is a term coined by Charles Fort to describe extraordinary human capabilities generally associated with the paranormal. Hiller’s video and sound installation employs dramatic wall-size projections to explore both the promise and the threat of telekinetic powers in adolescent girls in the popular imagination. Juxtaposing “acceptable” or even holy otherworldly communication with voices tinged with the demonic, Hiller questions the differences between mystical experiences that fall either inside or outside validating religious institutions. Echoing the cultural trope that young females are particularly susceptible to control by malevolent forces, the girls in Hiller’s piece represent the fear of the irrational by embodying or hosting or being a conduit for the spirit of the other. Hiller’s work explores the subjective boundaries between good and bad powers, and in doing so reveals the deeply ingrained myths and prejudices about the varieties of religious experience.

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