Opening reception: Friday, September 10, 6-8 pm
Luhring Augustine is pleased to present Heroes Of Birth, an exhibition of new work by Pipilotti Rist. This is Rist’s third solo exhibition at the gallery and will feature the debut of two video installations as well as a more intimately-scaled video sculpture.
In the entry gallery All or Nothing (2010) is a triptych of LCD screens mounted on the wall; it is surrounded by an altar with daily offerings such as fresh flowers and water for visitors to pause and quench their thirst. This sculpture features imagery that walks the line between the corporal and the spiritual - body parts ripple in rhythmic motion, mesmerizing in their perpetual search for synchronicity.
Layers Mama Layers (2010), in the gallery’s main space, extends and amplifies Rist’s iconic experiential style. The space is filled with cascading, diaphanous fabrics which descend from the ceiling and become translucent screens for multiple video projections. As viewers wind through this otherworldly space their bodies, along with the ghostly gray cloth become the undulating canvas for the projections. The room is filled with melodic sounds which, accompanied by the roving projections create a meditative rhythmic environment. Demonstrating an evolution in Rist’s practice, Layers Mama Layers integrates computer graphic elements into her characteristic filmed footage.
The rear gallery is covered by two wallpaper patterns designed by the artist; suspended from the ceiling in the center of the room is Massachusetts Chandelier (2010), a luminous, tiered object. The translucent volumes of the underpants, which were collected from the artist and her friends and family, are filled with warm light from within and lit from the outside by two video projections.
Pipilotti Rist (b. 1962, Grabs, Switzerland) has exhibited extensively in major international institutions and has received numerous awards including, most recently, the prestigious Joan Miró Prize from the Fundació Caixa Girona in Spain. Current solo exhibitions are Friendly Game – Electronic Feelings, at Fundació Juan Miró, Barcelona and Schliessen Sie mir das Kleid, Danke! (Close My Dress, Thank You) at Museum Langmatt, Baden, Switzerland. Recent exhibitions include Elixir – The video organism of Pipilotti Rist, which travelled last year from Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, Netherlands to KIASMA Museum for Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland and Pour Your Body Out (7534 Cubic Meters) at The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Her work can be seen in numerous publications and in the collections of museums and institutions worldwide, including The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, the Kunsthaus Zurich, Switzerland, the Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Gent, Belgium; and the Montreal Museum of Fine Art. Rist currently lives and works in Zürich, Switzerland.
