Invasions and fakes: Susan Hiller in conversation with Alexandra Kokoli

This chapter presents the conversation between Alexandra Kokoli, Senior Lecturer in Visual Culture, Fine Art, Middlesex University, and Susan Hiller, an internationally renowned artist living and working in Berlin and London. Discussion revolves around spiritualism and technology. The chapter focuses on Susan Hiller's Auras: Homage to Marcel Duchamp, an installation of photographic portraits with 'auras', clouds of colourful light surrounding and sometimes partly covering the faces of the people photographed. According to the work's subtitle, the Auras collection is in homage to Marcel Duchamp. Marcel Duchamp adapted various forms of esoteric discourse to his own purposes. He is best known of course for his use of alchemy, alchemical vocabulary, and quasi-alchemical manipulations in The Large Glass but he was familiar with other elements of occult and esoteric thought of the time, as were many other artists.