MCA Sydney announces new exhibition by Swiss artist Pipilotti Rist

Date
4 August 2017
Above

Pipilotti Rist, 4th Floor to Mildness from the Mildness Family, 2016
Installation view, Pipilotti Rist: Pixel Forest
New Museum, New York, US, 2016
Courtesy the artist, Hauser & Wirth and Luhring Augustine
© the artist, photograph: EPW Studio

Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art has announced a new solo exhibition by Swiss visual artist Pipilotti Rist to include sculpture and video work.

The artist’s work has developed from Super 8 films to installations spanning fully immersive environments. Defined by her liberal use of colour as a means through which to explore the body, the natural world and technology, Pipilotti’s work has even been referenced by Beyonce, who last year nodded to Pipilotti Rist’s film Ever is Over All in her heavily-acclaimed visual album Lemonade on the track Hold Up which shows Beyonce walking in slow motion down the street twirling a baseball bat.

The exhibition, titled Pipilotti Rist: Sip my Ocean invites viewers to fully engage with Pipilotti’s work by lounging in the site-specific environment on beds, cushions on the floor or oversized furniture in a surreal nod to Alice in Wonderland. Elsewhere, visitors are encouraged to waft through floating fabric and hanging lights, engaging with the work as it is displayed on large-scale projections or tiny monitors.

“Pipilotti Rist has achieved international acclaim as one of the pioneers of experimental video art and multimedia installations,” MCA said in an announcement. “Incorporating video and sculpture, her dazzling environments plunge viewers into colourful kaleidoscopic projections which explore the relationship between nature, the body and technology. The exhibition Pipilotti Rist: Sip my Ocean presents the spectrum of Rist’s groundbreaking practice, from her early single-channel videos of the 1980s to her large-scale audio-visual installations and recent immersive environments. Her work is an ode to the heart and the intellect, to the big emotions that sustain us as human beings and to the beauty of the world and the universe around us.”

The exhibition’s curator and MCA Senior Curator, Natasha Bullock added: “Pipilotti Rist brings ideas and feelings together, and does so through the prism of video. Her imaginary worlds carve a unique vision, with all the attendant depth and weight of painting – an art form that has culturally sustained us, and our imaginations, for centuries. Rist, however paints with lights, cameras and keyboards.”

Pipilotti Rist: Sip my Ocean will form the most comprehensive exhibition of the artist’s work in Australia so far. The exhibition is part of the Sydney International Art Series. It will run 1 November — 18 February 2018.

Above

Pipilotti Rist
Administrating Eternity, 2011
Installation view, Pipilotti Rist: Eyeball Massage
Hayward Gallery London, London, 2011
Courtesy the artist, Hauser & Wirth and Luhring Augustine
© Pipilotti Rist, photograph: Linda Nylind

Above

Pipilotti Rist
Administrating Eternity, 2011
Installation view, Pipilotti Rist: Eyeball Massage
Hayward Gallery London, London, 2011
Courtesy the artist, Hauser & Wirth and Luhring Augustine
© Pipilotti Rist, photograph: Linda Nylind

Above

Pipilotti Rist
Administrating Eternity, 2011
Installation view, Komm Schatz, wir stellen die Medien um & fangen nochmals von verne an, Kunsthalle Krems, Krems, Austria, 2011
Courtesy the artist, Hauser & Wirth and Luhring Augustine
© Pipilotti Rist, photograph: Lisa Rastl

Above

Pipilotti Rist
Ever Is Over All (still), 1997
Single channel projectors, players, sound system, paint, carpet
Courtesy the artist, Hauser & Wirth and Luhring Augustine
© the artist

Above

Pipilotti Rist
Pipilotti Rist, Gnade Donau Gnade (Mercy Danube Mercy), 2014
Installation view, Komm Schatz, wir stellen die Medien um & fangen nochmals von verne an, Kunsthalle Krems, Krems, Austria, 2011
Courtesy the artist, Hauser & Wirth and Luhring Augustine
© Pipilotti Rist, photograph: Lisa Rastl

Above

Muda Mathis & Pipilotti Rist
Japsen (still), 1988
Single-channel video, sound, colour
Courtesy the artists, Hauser & Wirth and Luhring Augustine
© Muda Mathis, Pipilotti Rist

Above

Pipilotti Rist
Sip My Ocean (still), 1996
Two-channel video installation with sound, color: projectors, players, sound system, paint, carpet, sound by Anders Guggisberg and Pipilotti Rist after Wicked Game (1989) by Chris Isaak
Courtesy the artist, Hauser & Wirth and Luhring Augustine
© the artist

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Bryony Stone

Bryony joined It's Nice That as Deputy Editor in August 2016, following roles at Mother, Secret Cinema, LAW, Rollacoaster and Wonderland. She later became Acting Editor at It's Nice That, before leaving in late 2018.

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