Pipilotti Rist, Pioneer of Video Art | Brilliant Ideas Ep. 55

brilliant ideas powered by Hyundai Motor [Music] Times Square New York this giant projection is the work of Swiss artist poppy Lottie wrist the video is part of an important exhibition of her work that's about to open at the new Museum in the city you clearly had the feeling that the video wanted to break out you had the feeling that the video wanted to come towards you there was something extremely visceral extremely physical about it she's one of the most acclaimed artists working anywhere in the world a pioneer of video art and multimedia installations her works envelop viewers in kaleidoscopic projections that fuse the natural world with technology the first thing is that you are really seduced she mesmerizes us immediately it really is about you know kind of unscrewing the top of your skull and getting out of your normal way of looking at things every time you see it there is a immediate connection for that work because somehow those images are the same images you have dreamt of we Pilate wrists had his epiphany that for the first time she actually compelled video to handbag you can pack it all in she can bring in paintings she can bring in installation she could bring in poetry she can bring in music she bring in sound she can bring in everything it's in a way yeah it's a handbag of course there is art deals with all the inequality and problems which I appreciate a lot but for me I decided not to use my force to always tell what's wrong but sucking out the possible pleasures of daily life and of our extreme complex body it's just what I want to give back [Music] could be Lottie lives and works in Zurich hey come with me hidden beneath an office building her studio is a treasure trove of the materials she needs to make her technically complex works her art might be willfully chaotic but her studio is a hub of productivity and careful organization this was from this was the pixel forest in the beginning like props artificial grass here you see still DVDs former masters haha voltage meters schools electro hippie Lottie was born in grabs a remote part of the Swiss Alps you're very wild loud house and my mother would be in her sleeping room reading books and we could often organize our daily lives ourselves people not is a person that is quite exceptional not only in her work but in her behavior I think is the only person I know who chose her own name by taking inspiration from the wonderful fairy tales and fables of Pippi longstockings in school people called me B P and family called me Lochte I'm always afraid I cannot live up to the name because the name really promises completely a free with no constraints without fears and I'm still working on that [Music] my work was always colorful but I think reality is as colorful as my work and I remember in the video class my teacher would say oh this college you can't use it's there to primary and read and that's true then I even more use them because he didn't want them Pippi lotty's very first video work brought her national attention Switzerland in the 1980s was obviously a very different media scape than it is today you just have to think that television was largely a state monopoly so imagine what it means for a 24 year old girl to in a sense take control or storm the media and by creating this video and acting as a crossover between a diva and a goof an antidote to the oblique video art of the late 20th century Pippi lottie's work stood out for being fast-paced irreverent and with her signature use of vivid color the idea that we do in Western society and especially in Europe colors are suspicious because they are sucking you in you have no control over it it's very emotional you fall into them as black and white is really a line and you can make a lector a clear word and black means respectful person and colorful means you're your gypsy proletarian exoticism so that was always for me clear that I have to stand up for the colors and I love them for me colors is always a symbol of life if I'm going to a depressed face I see less color she use everything that video can give with the colors and with the music and with her acting with the speed with the slow man with everything how she could warm up this cold medium it wasn't just what was in the video that people Otte revolutionized but also how people saw her work selfless in the bath of lava features Pippi Lottie screaming up to the viewer from what looked like a portal into the underworld it's a small monitor that's embedded in the floor and it looks like she's trapped in this space trying to get out you know this is where there is sort of this Alice in Wonderland playfulness in her work I used a naked figure in Hell but for me naked figure means no time no social class but the work deals with the idea of the hell of Christian Jewish Muslim idea of if we don't do what God wants or other people tell that God wants that we are punished oh please [Music] Pippy Lahti wrist is a Swiss artist known for her immersive installations bewitching use of color and idiosyncratic take on life she's curious about everything first work back in the 90s that were produced with her was every so verall and she smashed my car the figure who is smashing the cars is representing deaf human in the 20s or 21st century she stands for us that we accept so many things are just given and she does an action to pretend that smashing the cars would be also given normal that she would do that everyday this beautiful transgression yeah feeling free to do something in the in a wonderful way because it is it is a flower it's with the force of nature too to transgress against what is also very aggressive like a car or the industry in the car these little contained boxes it's like she's trying to smash open that contained box of our own thinking and it is sort of this symbol of just kind of you know booze wine individuality everyone's got their car park and I think that's a good kind of manifesto for what she's trying to do with her art to take something beautiful like it was someone walking down the street with a rose but then to really crack open are locked down self-contained view of the world that the film is made even more resonant by the fact that it's shot in the streets of Zurich which is a city many people associated with a certain idea of order and discipline N and here you have this explosion of colors and unconventional behavior which is a defining feature of all people of this world it was a wish to encourage us to think about if we change our daily rituals very slightly it can have a big effect her video pickle porno or zit porn was a reaction to the explosion of video pornography in the 90s it explores how porn might be reimagined from a female perspective what she is doing is say is putting forth a very different idea of how you could look at a female body it's a very up-close cellular version almost a sense of a celebration of a kind of sensuality that's not geared towards voyeurism ADL's it's much more interesting to be part of a sexual act than to watch it in China I think women prefer to know what the other feels and sees inside in a in a sex moment then looking from outside to to animals I had the chance to show the human being like lizard because we try always to look like a race car without the chaotic structure we we actually are and when we kiss somebody and I'm very short-sighted I can open my eye and I see all the wrinkles and all the little pores Louise it and pornography and like it's move so we finds what disgusting and what is actually disgusting and isn't the zips or something supernatural and it's just part of it all these little bits that you're like oh this is disgusting but it's not disgusting in her world for the last 15 years Pippi Lottie has focused on making installations that go beyond the single channel video screen she's involved in every step of production from filming and editing to design and installation great job you're the best I think she's a total control freak from the beginning to the end but what hasn't changed is everything starts with her camera which she uses like an extension of her body [Music] there is something when you look at hippies videos that feels like somehow there's an organic kind of camerawork where one the camera is often moving its fluid and it's just absorbing details going in very very close in a way that also conjures a kind of curiosity about what things are made of you know her use of cameras is the one of a painter using a brush and color and you know this is vintage people ah T's coming in a very close going away moving around it's it's a beautiful beautiful way like water or the clouds Pilates installations use high-tech cameras complex editing techniques animation music and sound scapes to explore the relationship of Technology with the natural world in her fantastic identic landscapes it seems like nature and the digital are united in the ecstasy of communication she has hinted to the fact that if we do treat technology properly with respect and with enthusiasm maybe new possibilities can be opened the possibility to break out of the square was given by the protectors and then the projector is like wow it's like a wonder lamp but for me any light any technique is always a very simple copy of the Sun the Sun would be the strongest projector she explained also to me how it is important for her to always use the latest technology because her intention was always to represent as much as possible what she thinks we actually see she was definitely a pioneer in terms of trying to create expanded installations for video for projecting videos in different kinds of places and the audience that is lined down on on cushions and there is a sense of gosh I'm going to check all my everyday worries and thoughts at the door and I'm going to just float down the river of these images and see where they take me Oh [Music] Swiss artist Pippi Lottie wrist has been invited to make a new artwork for her exhibition at the new Museum in Manhattan she found inspiration in a very different environment the muddy banks of the Rhine on the border of Austria and Switzerland when I went down with the camera I discovered a world I have not imagined that when the sea lilies rot they produce gas so under the sea lilies are a lot of gas bubbles and I thought wow that's like money from the other side and I was so fascinated by the world there and the colors and also the dirt I was really obsessed with dirt I wanted to be as dirty and stinky as possible so I just went in it was a physical experience but then also opening up from your new world [Music] there is the idea of opening the ceiling of a room a church a palace with the illusion of a fugue to the sky and obviously to the old associations that connect the sky to have an order to God or to a spiritual dimension so in this new piece people ah type moves the screen from being in front of your eyes to the ceiling into the sky you realize that people lot is suggesting that maybe the God is not in the sky but is in the water [Music] I never understood why I should limit myself on a normed format why not use the whole space and welcomed the visitor who is not sitting home in front of the TV or today in front of the telephone but really takes the effort into ritual to come there so then really welcome this person and with light and projector is just the most welcoming and positive and energizing way [Music] the frontal experience she doesn't like she wants to lay on your back or on your belly and the installation shots you know they very often unless they are film stills they need to have a she wants people in there this is this is what's this is classical PP PP Lottie shoot photo shooting it only makes sense to the people it's interactive in the purest way often I want them to feel coming home or feeling not alone or in that new work fourth floor I wanted them to feel like even if you're completely in the mud that there is a breakthrough also on show is a work in which pipi Lahti shatters the screen entirely breaking it apart pixel by pixel it surrounded by moving image now and produce it ourselves as well and now under the sudden we are there there's an overload of information and she said well I want to break this down again in single pixels and we just look at the single color dots again it was important me that from the beginning that they are not in a geometric order that the distances between them are in a way organic or coincidentally and that people could walk through the pixels and I'm convinced that our brain looks a bit similar that all the thinking and the neuron synapses are also little electrical low voltage signals probably that's the reason why people reacted so strongly to it she often works with scale know that just the imagination that you yourself get to the size of almost of a pix Lori RIE in an earlier phase I mean this you are tiny tiny as a pixel almost so you would have to go many meters back to actually see that it is a video image she addresses the different senses not only the visual sense so I think that sort of multi-sensory aspect is something which is particularly strong you experience the peace not only with your eyes but also with your feet it appeals to all your senses you're given access to a reality there is superior or more intense or surreal and that somehow you're too jaded to see and she reminds you that there is a possibility to see things so intensive there's a sense of trying to recover some way of knowing the world that we already have in us but that we've seriously suppressed as part of our contract with the world about what being a responsible adult is what's very important from his/her view of beauty like what is alive is is beautiful so look at it closely there is no ugliness there I think it's all about love however it's about love to yourselves is love to the other it is love to nature even to you love to mortality to beauty and third and all of that I think that's a message [Music] I get often critique that celebrate pleasure or celebrate beauty is often treated as being corrupt but I think to to work on beauty and pleasure without selling something is extremely needed that we can relax our brains that we can contemplate come back to us advertisement always tries to tell us how individual we are and we need this product now but we are such a tribe and if I can contribute to that ritual to feel a tribe again then I'm lucky [Music] [Music] [Music] brilliant ideas powered by Hyundai Motor

Channel: Bloomberg Markets and Finance

Views: 52,460

Rating: 4.9491525 out of 5

Keywords: Bloomberg, Pipilotti Rist, Brilliant Ideas, Projection, Video Art, Visceral, Times Square

Id: nCusgvPo5vM

Length: 24min 15sec (1455 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 14 2017