Pipilotti Rist, 2006, from the catalogue.
From the press release: Pipilotti Rist is one of the most prominent artists working today, best known for her dream-like video installations and colour-drenched imagery. Probing both physical and psychological dimensions her exploration of the body, our senses, rituals and taboos are at once poetical, intimate and playfully entertaining.
The exhibition will include work that is central to Rist’s production including the title-piece "Tyngdkraft, var min vän" ("Gravity, Be My Friend") - a new large-scale audiovisual installation being specially produced for Magasin 3. The title refers both to the events in the film and the viewer’s experience of the piece.
In conjunction with the exhibition Magasin 3 is producing a catalogue in collaboration with Lars Müller Publishers allowing the reader to listen in on a private conversation between Pipilotti Rist and Richard Julin, the curator of the exhibition.
Pipilotti Rist was born in 1962 in Grabs, in the Swiss Rhine Valley. She lives and works in Zurich and in the mountains of Switzerland.
Pipilotti Rist has since the 1990’s attracted attention for her dreamlike video installations with their intense and brilliant colours, in which she investigates both physical and psychological space. Playfully and intimately she probes our bodies, our senses, rituals and taboos.
Pipiliotti Rist has had both solo and group exhibitions in institutions such as Fondazione Prada (Milan), Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Kunsthalle Wien (Vienna), MOMA (New York), the Center for Contemporary Art (Kitakyushu) and at various biennales such as Istanbul, Sante Fe, Shanghai and São Paolo. Rist’s contribution to the 2005 Venice Biennale was the magnificent and critically acclaimed piece Homo Sapiens Sapiens, which was installed in one of the city’s churches.
In the spring of 2007 a new, specially produced work can also be seen at night on the square outside Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris or via a webcam on the institution’s website: http://www.centrepompidou.fr/webcam/popup5.html.
Pipilotti Rist was also awarded the prestigious commission to create the visual identity for The Armory Show 2007 in New York.
The exhibition at Magasin 3 is Rist’s first solo exhibition in Scandinavia and includes works that are central to her oeuvre, as well as two completely new pieces.
Download information sheet as PDF:
PDF (p. 1) >
PDF (p. 2) >
Read more http://www.pipilottirist.net/
CONTENTS:
Prologue by David Neuman, director Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall
People who feel that talking about art ruins it should stop reading now - conversation between the artist and Richard Julin, chief curator
Exhibition catalogue no 36 published by Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall in three separate editions in Swedish, English and German.
160 pages, color. Richly illustrated. Hard cover. Published 2007 in collaboration with Lars Müller Publishers
ISBN 978-91-976646-0-8 / ISBN 978-3-03778-107-4 / 978-3-03778-108-1
Price: 24.90 EUR
Order the book here > or here >
(Excerpt from the text, Richard Julin and Pipilotti Rist)
RJ: I’d like to mention something about your behaviour that strikes me every time we meet. It’s a kind of emphatic respect you show towards everyone around you. It’s in the way you speak but also in the way you act. For instance, you hold the door open for everyone! I believe this respectful behaviour towards others is also echoed in your art. Does what I’m saying feel like a fair description of you?
PR: For me the question of ethics and motivation is of burning interest as I am currently in a phase of upheaval and change. There is a political stance that affects my work, and a personal one. The moment one talks about certain things they can lose their innocence – like when someone says you are so spontaneous, you are so warm-hearted, or you are so attentive... For me this is about morality or an ethics of behaviour, something you don’t talk about. It reflects the way you see people. Then there is your political attitude. Somewhere in between all kinds of errors in the system light up. I had to learn that there’s no such thing as the right ideology. I’m suspicious of people who lump together morality and their vision of an ideal world into a single, hermetic ideology or a religious hypothesis. Yet at the same time I’m curious about the ‘new subject’. As for opening doors… Well, you just met my mother Anna down on the street. She brought us children up to be polite and to look after others. A part of that comes down to the values you adopt as a child. It is important to me that people pay attention to one another and that we take each other seriously. These are theoretical ideas that suit who I am, and at the same time I feel as though I lost quite a number of years due to the narrow perspective of leftwing ideology and the fear of divine punishment. I want to hold the door open out of my own free will. At the moment I find all this quite confusing.
RJ: Do you allow yourself to doubt?
PR: People often ask me if my art is feminist. I am a feminist, that’s a point of honour and logical, so long as society’s horizons are not equally accessible for everyone. But there are thousands of other insights that shape my inquiries. Even though I have a positive view of humanity, there is room for ambivalence in my work; accepting this should foster a certain mildness towards oneself. This is what I strive for in my work. When viewers experience my works I hope they will stop being quite so hard on themselves. Maybe this is what you are detecting. Of course, I am not actually where my works are. As a human being I can’t fully achieve the same nonchalance or power that I to some extent explicitly look for or distil in my works. As an individual I am not identical to my works. Sometimes I view myself as neurotic and anxious. But I made a conscious decision not to directly transfer such feelings into my work, even if I don’t deny them either.
....
RJ: I would like to discuss your new piece, “Tyngdkraft, var min vän”. Having seen the model, it is now clear that it is related to the pieces you made in the last two years, “Homo Sapiens Sapiens” in Venice and “A Liberty Statue for Löndön” in London.
PR: Yes, all three works offer the viewer or the listener a reclining position. I have always been interested in how the body moves in the room in relation to the work of art. The viewing ritual and physical posture appear almost to be given facts. I analyse movement towards art. The way to and then within the institution is a ritual, just like, say, how people in Stockholm go down to the harbour and into the warehouse where Magasin 3 is. It’s a small journey of its own. One takes some time off – comparable to what a church visit used to be – and spends ostensibly unproductive time in order to compose oneself and to think. I want to emphasise this meditative dimension by trying to get the installation to suspend gravity for a while and reduce muscle tension. It’s easier to relax one’s muscles when lying down. Most of the time, muscular activity means far more than simply performing the need to walk or keeping our skeleton in an upright position. All our thoughts, everything we see, everything we’re afraid of, is reflected in our muscle tone. This can also be approached the other way round. Your ability to relax your muscles will have an effect on your thinking. It is what’s called ‘somatopsychic’. To make “Tyngdkraft, var min vän” I went under water again. In fact it is the sister piece of “Sip My Ocean”. I was talking to someone about this last week: we should really call our planet “Water” rather than “Earth”. In purely practical, technical terms, I’ve now learned to shoot underwater HD. We worked with two different cameras. Now I know how I’d like to work underwater. In the Venice piece, Pepperminta (who was played by Ewelina Guzik) was in a time before the Fall, before Original Sin, with her sister Edna. Beyond all social classes or temporal references. In the London piece, she returns to civilization. In Stockholm she is seen – simply speaking – transcending gravity and the seasons of the year together with another androgynous person. She flies away from the world. My nephew David, who played the second character, came to the shoot on the third day with his hair cut. [laughs] It was a massive shock! He’s my sister Ursula’s fifteen-year-old son. We spent two days filming on the Old Rhine. Then one night in an open-air swimming pool, where he suddenly turned up without his long hair. He hadn’t realised that he was playing the role of an androgynous figure. I should have made that explicit to him as a lay actor. “Tyngdkraft, var min vän” describes the fantasy of living beyond gender difference and simulates our dissolution into water, air and atoms.
WORKS IN THE EXHIBITION
"Blutraum" ("Blood Room"), 1993/98
audio video installation
"Das Zimmer" ("The Room"), 1994/2007
Installation. A sofa, an armchair, a lamp, a picture, a remote control (all larger than life size) and a TV monitor showing a number of video works.
"Selbstlos im Lavabad" ("Selfless in The Bath of Lava"), 1994
Audio video installation. LCD monitor let into the floor, a sound system.
"Sip My Ocean", 1996
Audio video installation. 2 video projections reflected in the corner of a room, blue walls and blue carpet, a sound system. Music after "Wicked Game" written by Chris Isaak, interpreted by Anders Guggisberg and Pipilotti Rist.
"Kleines Vorstadthirn" ("Small Suburb Brain"), 1999/2007
Audio video installation. A video projection, a sound system, spoken in Swiss German with English subtitles.
"Apple Tree Innocent On Diamond Hill", 2003
Video installation. Elm branch hanging, flying horizontally, calmly, freely; light projected onto a collection of suspended white and translucent objects from "The Innocent Collection, 1985 – approx. 2032", silent.
"Deine Raumkapsel" ("Your Space-Capsule"), 2006
Audio video installation. Wooden transport crate, a turning projector, a sound system, a bed, a chair, wallpaper and diverse objects in a scale of 1:6, moon and stars.
"Tyngdkraft, var min vän" ("Gravity, Be My Friend"), 2007
Audio video installation. 2 projections onto screens mounted on the ceiling, 2 wild carpet sculptures for the audience to lie on, a sound system. Music by Anders Guggisberg and Pipilotti Rist.
VIDEO WORKS SCREENED IN "THE ROOM"
at Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall
"Hau die Sonne in den Computer" ("Bang The Sun Into The Computer"), 1989, 1 min.
Produced for "MAX" (Swiss Television DRS, 14.12.1989, edited by Barbara Bürer) as answer to her question: Are you a political artist?
"You Called Me Jacky", 1990, 4 mins.
Video. Music: "Edna and Jacky" by Kevin Coyne
"Presleytochter" ("Presley’s Daughter"), 1994, 2 mins.
Video. Camera: Andrea Rist, with: Tamara Rist and Turabi Fidan
"(Entlastungen) Pipilottis Fehler" (("Absolutions) Pipilotti’s Mistakes"), 1988, 12 mins.
Video. Long version, music by Hans Feigenwinter, Les Reines Prochaines and Pipilotti Rist.
"Blauer Leibesbrief" ("Blue Bodily Letter"), 1992-1998, 1 min.
Part of the audio video installation with a diagonal large projection. Music by Pipilotti Rist
"I’m Not The Girl Who Misses Much", 1986, 5 mins.
Video. Music after the song «Happiness is a warm gun» by Lennon/McCartney.
"Saadet Türkös sings Swan in Turkish", 1996, 4 mins.
Song by Anders Guggisberg and Pipilotti Rist. For the installation «Shooting Divas», work in progress at Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève/Paolo Colombo.
"Ever Is Over All", 1997, 4 mins.
Part of audio video installation, the left side of a double projection. Music by Anders Guggisberg and Pipilotti Rist.
"Pickelporno" ("Pimple Porno"), 1992, 12 mins.
Video. Music by Peter Bräker, Les Reines Prochaines and Pipilotti Rist
"Greetings to Stockholm (Rainspot)", 1998, 1 min.
TV clip for ARKIPELAG TV.
"To See How You See (a portrait of Cornelia Providoli)", 2004, 5 mins.
Video. Music by Anders Guggisberg and P. Rist, produced for the video anthology by Bick Productions NY.
"Als der Bruder Meiner Mutter geboren wurde, duftete es nach Birnenblüten vor dem braungebrannten Sims" ("When My Mother’s Brother Was Born It Smelled Like Wild Pear Blossom In Front Of The Brown-Burnt Sill"), video, 1992, 4 mins.
Music by Heinz Rohrer und Pipilotti Rist
"Sexy Sad I", video, 1987, 4 mins.
Music by Lori Hersberger and Pipilotti Rist after the song "Sexy Sadie" by Lennon/McCartney.
"A Liberty Statue For Löndön" 2005, 9 mins.
Part of the audio video installation with two projections against the ceiling. Music by Anders Guggisberg and Pipilotti Rist.
Part of the video installation "Open My Glade", for the Astrovision Screen at Times Square NY, with Public Art Fund, 2000, 7 x 1 mins., silent.
"Tribute To Your Inner"
"No Screen Can Keep Us Apart"
"Dinner Is Ready In 5 Minutes"
"Be Nice To Me"
"I Want To Be Guilty"
"Help Me To Be Honest"
"You’re Not Perfect That’s Perfect"
7 x 1 min., 2000
"Tyngdkraft, var min vän" ("Gravity, Be My Friend"), 2007 |
"Tyngdkraft, var min vän" ("Gravity, Be My Friend"), 2007 |
"Tyngdkraft, var min vän" ("Gravity, Be My Friend"), 2007 |
"Das Zimmer", 1994-2000 |
"Apple Tree Innocent On Diamond Hill", 2003 |
"Deine Raumkapsel" ("Your Space-Capsule"), 2006 |
"Sip My Ocean", 1996 |
"Selbstlos im Lavabad" ("Selfless in The Bath of Lava"), 1994 |
Pipilotti Rist in her studio, 2006 |
ARTIST TALK AT MAGASIN 3 STOCKHOLM KONSTHALL
February 9, 2 pm
Pipilotti Rist and Richard Julin, lecture by the artist and conversation in conjunction with the opening.
Please note! Limited seats. Welcome!
Pipilotti Rist and Richard Julin, chief curator at Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall, continue their conversation they started in Zurich in connection with the preparations for Rist’s exhibition at Magasin 3. Their conversation began at the artist’s studio and carried on into the evening back at her home, while they cooked and ate dinner together. The resulting book "Congratulations!" is a very personal and fascinating conversation that reveals new dimensions of the world of Pipilotti Rist, with anecdotes from the creation process and reflections on life, art and food.
THE EXHIBITION IS SUPPORTED BY
PRESS CLIPPINGS (in Swedish)
Birgitta Rubin's interview published in Dagens Nyheter 2007-02-06 http://www.dn.se/DNet/jsp/polopoly.jsp?a=614322
Clemens Poellinger's interview published in Svenska Dagbladet 2007-02-08 http://www.svd.se/dynamiskt/kultur/did_14583128.asp
Cristina Karlstam's review published in Upsala Nya Tidning 2007-02-10 http://www2.unt.se/avd/1,1786,MC=5-AV_ID=578856,00.html
Towe Matre's feature, broadcasted by Radio P1, Studio 1 http://www.sr.se/webbradio
Cecilia Blomberg's review broadcasted by Radio P1, Kulturnytt http://www.sr.se/webbradio
