Pipilotti Rist

Elisabeth Charlotte Rist (born in June 21th 1962 in Grabs, Sankt Gallen, Switzerland) is a well-known video artist. She lives and now lives and works in Zurich and Los Angeles.

Biography

Elisabeth Charlotte Rist was born in 1962 in Grabs, Sankt Gallen, in Switzerland. Since her childhood she has been nicknamed Pipilotti. The name refers to the novel Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren.

Rist studied at the Institute of Applied Arts in Vienna, through 1986. She later studied video at the School of Design ("Schule für Gestaltung") in Basel, Switzerland. In 1997 her work was first featured in the Venice Biennial, where she was awarded the Premio 2000 Prize.

From 1988 through 1994 she was member of the music band and performance group Les Reines Prochaines.

From 2002 to 2003, she was invited by Professor Paul McCarthy to teach at UCLA as a visiting faculty member.

Pipilotti Rist currently lives with her common law partner Balz Roth, with whom she has a son, named Himalaya.

Works

During her studies Pipilotti Rist began making super 8 films. Her works generally last only a few minutes, and contained alterations in their colors, speed, and sound. Her works generally treat issues related to gender, sexuality, and the human body.

In contrast to those of many other conceptual artists, her colorful and musical works transmit a sense of happiness and simplicity. Rist's work is regarded as feminist by some art critics. Her works are held by many important art collections worldwide.

Works

In "I'm Not The Girl Who Misses Much" (1986) Rist dances before a camera in a black dress with uncovered breasts. The images are often monochromatic and fuzzy. Rists repeatedly sings "I'm not the girl who misses much", a reference to the first line of the song "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" by John Lennon. As the video approaches its end, the image becomes increasingly blue and fuzzy and the sound stops.

Rist achieved notoriety with "Pickelporno" (1992), a work about the female body and the sexual exitation. The fish eye camera moves over the bodies of a couple. The images are charge by intense colors, and are simultaneously strange, sensual and ambiguous.

"Ever is Over All" (1997) shows in slow-motion a young woman (Rist) walks along a city street, smashing the windows of parked cars with a large hammer in the shape of a tropical flower. At one point a police officer greets her. The clip has been purchased by the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

Rist's sixteen video segments titled "Open My Glade" were played once every hour on a screen at Times Square in New York City, an project of the "Messages to the Public" program, which was founded in 1980.

Super 8 films, videos, and video installations

* 1984 - St. Marxer Friedhof (Sankt Marx Cemetery) - 4 minutes
* 1986 - Das Gute (The Good) - 9 minutes.
* 1986 - I'm Not The Girl Who Misses Much - 7:45 minutes. - [http://www.hers.steirischerbst.at/htm/a_rist.htm Link] [http://www.raisatzoom.it/archivio/video/0/200/290/293/pipilotti.rm Link 2 (Real Video)]
* 1987 - Sexy Sad I - 4:36 minutes [http://www.eai.org/eai/tape.jsp?itemID=8829 Link]
* 1988 - (Entlastungen) Pipilottis Fehler ((Discharges) Pipilottis Mistakes) - 11:10 minutes [http://www.newmedia-art.org/cgi-bin/show-oeu.asp?ID=00002268&lg=GBR Link]
* 1988 - Japsen. With Muda Mathis - 12 minutes
* 1989 - Die Tempodrosslerin saust. With Muda Mathis - 14 mit
* 1990 - You Called Me Jacky - 4 minutes [http://www.newmedia-art.org/cgi-bin/show-oeu.asp?ID=00002269&lg=GBR Link]
* 1992 - Pickelporno - 12 minutes [http://www.zkm.de/goetz/exhibit54/langDE/exhibit.tpl Link] [http://www.newmedia-art.org/cgi-bin/show-oeu.asp?ID=00002270&lg=GBR Link 2]
* 1992 - Als der Bruder meiner Mutter geboren wurde, duftete es nach wilden Birnenblüten vor dem braungebrannten Sims (When My Mother's Brother Was Born, It Smelt of Pear Flowers Before the Brown Cornice) - 4 minutes [http://www.eai.org/eai/tape.jsp?itemID=8823 Link]
* 1992 - Blue Bodily Lettre
* 1993 - Blutclip - 2:50 minutes [http://www.eai.org/eai/tape.jsp?itemID=8825 Link]
* 1994 - Selbstlos im Lavabad (Selfless in the Bath of Lava)
* 1995 - I'm a Victim Of This Song - 5 minutes
* 1996 - Sip My Ocean - 8 minutes
* 1997 - Ever Is Over All
* 1998 - Remake of the Weekend [http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/werke/remake-of-the-weekend/ Link]
* 1999 - Regenfrau (I am called a plant)
* 1999 - Extremities
* 1999 - Vorstadthirn (Suburban Brain)
* 2000 - Open My Glade - 1 Min. [http://www.publicartfund.org/pafweb/projects/00/rist_p_s00.html Link]
* 2000 - Himalaya's Sister's Living Room
* 2000 - Closet Circuit
* 2001 - The Belly Button Like a Village Square [http://www.padt.org.uk/4thwall/rist/ristes.html Link]
* 2001 - Fliederstrudel (Fünf Uhr)
* 2001 - Related Legs [http://www.universes-in-universe.de/car/yokohama/trien1/exh-hall/d-rist.htm Link]
* 2004 - Herbstzeitlose
* 2005 - Homo sapiens sapiens - [http://www.grybay.com/movieclips.html Gry Bay homepage with clip]

Prizes

* 1988 – Prize of the Feminale Cologne
* 1991 – Swiss Federal Arts Scholarship
* 1994 – Manor-Prize, Sankt Gallen
* 1994 – Video Art Prize of the Swiss Bank Corporation
* 1995 – Scholarship of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)
* 1997 – Premio 2000 of the Biennale di Venezia
* 1998 – Nomination for the Hugo Boss Prize
* 1999 – Wolfgang-Hahn-Preis
* 2001 – Art Prize of the City of Zurich
* 2004 – 01 award und Honorary Professorship of the Universität der Künste, Berlin

Literature

Publications

* 1998 - "Himalaya, Pipilotti Rist 50 kg," incl. CD "we can't". Oktagon Verlag: Cologne. ISBN 3-89611-072-1
* 1998 - "Remake of the Weekend." incl.. CD. Oktagon: Cologne. ISBN 3-89611-046-2
* 2001 - "Pipilotti Rist." With contributions by Peggy Phelan, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Elisabeth Bronfen. Phaidon: London. ISBN 0-7148-3965-5
* 2001 - "Apricots Along The Street." Scalo: Zurich/Berlin/New York, ISBN 3-908247-50-0
* 2004 - "Jestem swoja wlasna obca swinia (Ich bin mein eigenes fremdes Schwein/I am my own foreign pig)." with Birgit Kempker. Centre for Contemporary Art/Centrum Sztuki Współczesnej: Warsaw. ISBN 83-88277-13-8

About Pipilotti Rist

* [http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0268/is_n10_v34/ai_18533855 Elizabeth Janus: "Pipilotti Rist, video artist", Art Forum, Summer 1996] (English)
* Parkett 48, 1996
* DU, June 1997
* Francis McKee: "Pipilotti Rist: Show a Leg". Tramway: New York 2002. ISBN 1-899551-26-3
* [http://www.artfocus.com/Rist69.html Andre Seleanu: "Pipilotti Rist at the Outer Frontiers of Video", Artfocus 69, 2000]
* Änne Söll: "Arbeit am Körper. Videos und Videoinstallationen von Pipilotti Rist." Schreiber: Munich 2004. ISBN 3-88960-069-7
* [http://www.kunsttexte.de/download/kume/soell.pdf Änne Söll: "Der Traum vom Fliegen – Dienstleistung und Geschlecht in Pipilotti Rists 'Pamela'"] (PDF)

External links

* [http://www.pipilottirist.net pipilottirist.net - Official Website]
* [http://artkrush.com/76015 Artkrush.com review of Pipilotti Rist's Wishing for Synchronicity at Houston's Contemporary Arts Museum, 1/2007]
* [http://www.artfacts.net/index.php/pageType/artistInfo/artist/3718/lang/1 "Current exhibitions and connection to galleries at Artfacts.Net"]

Videos

* [http://www.ubu.com/film/rist.html Compilation of 14 videos at UbuWeb]
* [http://www.pipilottirist.net/maplist.html Works available at pipilottirist.net]
* [http://www.kunstmuseumsg.ch/sammlung_12.html Objekt: Der TV-Lüster (1993)]
* [http://telemaquetime.free.fr/PRist.htm telemaquetime.free.fr: Many still images]
* [http://www.newmedia-art.org/cgi-bin/show-art.asp?LG=GBR&DOC=IDEN&ID=D408753 newmedia-art.org - Various works] (Real Video, QuickTime)
* [http://www.sfmoma.org/msoma/artists/rist.html Rist gives a tour through SFMOMA's exhibit]
* [http://www.zkm.de/goetz/artist38/langDE/artist.tpl Pipilotti Rist at the Goetz Collection, ZKM] (QuickTime)

Interviews

* [http://gewi.kfunigraz.ac.at/~blimp/full_text/pipi/pipi.html Interview on kfunigraz.ac.at] (German)
* [http://www.nadir.org/nadir/periodika/jungle_world/_98/16/28a.htm Interview in Jungle World, 15. April 1998] (German)
* [http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2479/is_3_28/ai_68660257 Interview in Afterimages 11/2000]
* [http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0425/is_4_59/ai_69294352/pg_1 Interview in Art Journal, Winter 2000]
* [http://www.weltwoche.ch/artikel/?AssetID=6900&CategoryID=62 Interview in Die Weltwoche 5/2004] (German)
* [http://www.contemporary-magazines.com/interview92.htm Interview in Contemporary, May 2007]

Reviews

* [http://www.artreview.com/forum/topic/show?id=1474022%3ATopic%3A477302 Review of FACT retropective, Liverpool, June 2008 in ArtReview]