“I always think it’s the only good work I ever did.” Swiss video artist Pipilotti Rist here tells the story of her first art video, which was made back in the mid-eighties – before MTV arrived on the scene.
Rist shares how she sent the video ‘I’m Not The Girl Who Misses Much’ (1986) (music by Lennon/McCartney) to a film festival, simply because she wanted to get hold of a festival ticket – not because she had any aspirations of becoming an artist. The film was shown at the festival, but with sound on only one channel, which made Rist get up and fill in the missing sound. The video depicts the artist in a very low cut dress – exposing her breasts – in an empty space, dancing around the room while repeatedly singing ‘I’m not the girl who misses much.’ The phrase is an adaption of the first line of the Beatles’ song ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun’, 1968.
Elisabeth Charlotte “Pipilotti” Rist (b. 1962) is a Swiss visual artist, who works with video, film and moving images, which are often displayed as projections. She takes her name from Pippi Longstockings, heroine of Swedish author Astrid Lindgren’s much-loved series of children’s books. Early on in her career she began making super 8 films, which generally last only a few minutes and contain alterations in their colours, speed and sound. Among the themes her work centres on are gender, sexuality and the human body. In 1996 her work was first featured in the Venice Biennial, where she was awarded the ‘Premio 2000 Prize’. Other awards include the ‘Wolfgang Hahn Prize’ (1999), the ‘Joan Miró Prize’ (2009) and the ‘Cutting the Edge Award’ at the 27th Annual Miami International Film Festival (2010). Rist’s works are a part of prominent museums worldwide such as MoMA in New York City and Tate Modern in London.
For more about Pipilotti Rist see: http://pipilottirist.net/
Pipilotti Rist was interviewed by Christian Lund at the Hayward Gallery in London, November 2011.
Camera: Christian Lund and Matthias Pilz
Produced by: Martin Kogi
Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2012
Supported by Nordea-fonden
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