The Great Hall in the New York Chamber of Commerce had intrigued performance artist Connie Beckley for some time when she approached Creative Time for help in securing it for Principles in Perspectives. Beckley derived her work for the Great Hall from 15th-century texts about optics, particularly the newly formulated laws of linear perspective, and alchemy.

An apt and frequently revived simile for the artist’s project, alchemy involves the pursuit not only of a method for transforming base metals into gold, but also for rendering an ultimate truth by which all known physical laws can be integrated and resolved.

Connie Beckley

Principles in Perspectives

Manhattan

1982