admin On novembre - 15 - 2011

 

9th November – 18th December 2011

Free Entrance

 

The first Italian solo exhibit of the artist Pipilotti Rist at Fondazione Nicola Trussardi opens, once again, the doors of the historical Manzoni movie theatre, that for over fifty years has been one of the most important cinemas in Milan. The elegant ambiance with fresco decorations becomes the perfect setting to Parasimpatico. The Swiss artist plays around with colour, light and carousel music leading the visitors into a world of enchantment.

The entrance hall of the theatre’s foyer welcomes you with an imposing chandelier made of underpants, Cape Cod Chandelier, animated by projections of colours and shapes. Just past the threshold that leads to the grand staircase we are ushered into a world of floating visions by Nothing, an installation machine that produces humungous soap bubbles that recall smoke. On the stairway ceiling the Lobe of the Lung video of a redhead girl crossing a tulip field, digging her hands into mud, coalesces with the underlying bas-relief that overwhelm the spectators’ senses.

All areas are enveloped by projections of fluctuating images, optical illusions and vibrant chromatics. At the top of the stairs, in dimly-lit foyer, illuminated by suffused light, two works are camouflaged in the surroundings blending into spaces that lead to the auditorium. Behind the bar, on a wall of soft-drink bottles, we have a glimpse of Rain Woman (I Am Called A Plant), where a nude woman with chalk-white skin, wearing a pink wig only, looks at her own reflection in a puddle within a large garden. In the lobby Sip My Ocean ebb and flows on the magnificent ceiling decorations with its gardens of waving seaweed and kingdoms of coral, that alternate with bodies hovering in water as if they were in a primordial amniotic fluid.

No place is neglected within the theatre, even the bathrooms are equipped with the artist’s beguiling video-art. Both the male and female lavatories have a small screen, with the electronic device well in sight and refined by gentle ribbons, that show abstract images of shapes and colours dissolving in constant transformation. Solution For Woman for the ladies and Solution For Man for the gents.

 

Finally, the magnificent, imposing auditorium houses three major video works. On the big original panoramic screen, Open My Glade, mimics a giant self-portrait, in which the artist’s face in close-up constantly presses against a glass, as if she were trapped in an aquarium. Extremities delivers details of human bodies (breasts, ears, feet, penises, mouths), floating in a black sky on the vaulted ceiling, as heavenly bodies drifting in galaxies. Homo Sapiens Sapiens, merrily interacts with Nicolò Segota’s fresco, betwixt Hieronymus Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights and the actual Garden of Eden, where physicality seems to reconcile with rationality and sensuality in a spiritual dimension that reclaims original sin.

Pipilotti Rist is amongst the most acclaimed contemporary artists, with her solo exhibitions that have been hosted in venues of the highest prestige, such as the MoMa in New York, The Hayward Gallery in London, the Centre Pompidou in Paris and the Venice Biennale. Elisabeth Charlotte Rist, owes her nom de plume to the mélange of her nickname Lotti, diminutive of Charlotte, and the character of Pippi Longstockings. The visionary artist has the ability of being provocatively sensual, avoiding vulgarity, with a touch of childhood wonder and reverie. Pipilotti’s works sweep you along into a bewitching voyage to a topsy-turvy land where dreams lurk.

by Chiara Spagnoli

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