Robert Wilson Video Portraits

PRODUCTION

Video production, international exhibition tour, and publication for Robert Wilson’s Video Portraits. Begun in 2004, the ongoing series includes more than 150 portraits of actors, animals, artists, athletes, and other personalities in carefully crafted tableaux. Matthew Shattuck produced the portraits, managed the exhibition as it traveled to museums, galleries, and cultural institutions around the world, and co-edited and contributed to the accompanying monograph, Robert Wilson: Video Portraits, published by Walther König.

THE WORK

Robert Wilson works across media without being bound to any one. His process finds its outlet in the architecture of an opera or a building, the stains of a watercolor, the design of a chair, the choreography of a dance, the rhythm of a sonnet, or a Video Portrait.

Combining lighting, costume, makeup, choreography, gesture, text, voice, set design, and narrative, the Video Portraits are a synthesis of Wilson’s art making. The medium is HD video, but the form blurs time-based cinema with the frozen moment of still photography, drawing on painting, sculpture, design, architecture, dance, theater, film, and contemporary culture. At first glance each portrait resembles a photograph. On closer inspection, it reveals Wilson’s theatrical language in the clarity and precision of HD.

“I always thought of them as a window in a room, or a fire in a fireplace. It is always there, always changing. It does not demand your constant attention. The still life is a real life.”
Robert Wilson

SUBJECTS

Johnny Depp, Salma Hayek, Sean Penn, Isabella Rossellini, Brad Pitt, Robert Downey Jr., Winona Ryder, Lady Gaga, Roberto Bolle, Steve Buscemi, Macaulay Culkin, Robin Wright, Willem Dafoe, Marianne Faithfull, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Alan Cumming, Peter Stormare, Jeanne Moreau, Isabelle Huppert, Juliette Binoche, Renée Fleming, JT LeRoy, Gabriella Ornstein, Martin Brand, Tatiana Platt, Princess Caroline of Monaco, Gao Xingjian, Dita Von Teese, Farah Diba, Norman Paul Fleming, Byambajav Ulambayar, Zhang Huan, Lucinda Childs, William Pope.L, Alexis Broschek, Luc Hoffmann, Maren Otto, Nigel Sylvester, Sofia Boutella, Shingo Iwasaki, Suzushi Hanayagi, Kool (snowy owl), Ivory (black panther), Boris (porcupine), Horned Frog, Celine (briard), Samson (skunk)

PUBLICATION

Robert Wilson: Video Portraits
Publisher: Walther König, Cologne
Editors: Peter Weibel, Matthew Shattuck, Harald Falckenberg
Foreword: Robert Wilson
Contributors: Norman Bryson, Ali Hossaini, Noah Khoshbin, Matthew Shattuck, Nicola Suthor, Peter Weibel, Robert Wilson
Published: 2011
Hardcover, 8.25 x 10.25 in, 223 pages, 80 color reproductions
English and German
ISBN: 9783865608505

EXHIBITION TOUR

2016

BOX Freiraum, Berlin, Germany, Dec 2, 2016 – Feb 27, 2017
Musée Lambinet, Versailles, France, Nov 5, 2016 – Feb 19, 2017
Villa Panza, Varese, Italy, Nov 4, 2016 – Oct 15, 2017
Turku Art Museum, Turku, Finland, Sep 16 – Nov 20

2015

Lichtsicht Biennale, Bad Rothenfelde, Germany, Sep 18, 2015 – Feb 7, 2016
Backlit, Nottingham, UK, Apr 11 – May 17
Art Basel Hong Kong (Bernier/Eliades Gallery), Hong Kong, Mar 24 – 26
Bernier/Eliades Gallery, Athens, Greece, Mar 9 – May 14

2014

Art Basel Miami Beach (Galerie Thomas Schulte), Miami Beach, Dec 3 – 7
Vitraria Glass +A Museum, Venice, Italy, Sep 27, 2014 – Jan 25, 2015
21_21 Design Sight, Tokyo, Japan, Jul 4 – Oct 5
Byrdcliffe Guild, Woodstock, NY, Apr 26 – Aug 30

2013

Slovak National Gallery, Bratislava, Slovakia, Dec 13, 2013 – Mar 23, 2014
artRAVE, New York, Nov 10
St. Moritz Art Masters, St. Moritz, Switzerland, Aug 23 – Sep 1
Onassis Cultural Centre, Athens, Greece, Apr 4 – Jul 7
Fondazione Carisbo, Bologna, Italy, Feb 2 – 22
Bologna Art Fair, Bologna, Italy, Jan 24 – 28

2012

Akademie der Künste, Berlin, Germany, Dec 7, 2012 – Feb 17, 2013
Galerija Klovićevi dvori, Zagreb, Croatia, Oct 8 – Dec 2
Palazzo Madama, Turin, Italy, Sep 20, 2012 – Jan 6, 2013
University of Toronto Art Centre, Toronto, Canada, Sep 11 – Oct 8
TIFF Cinematheque, Toronto, Canada, Jun 8
Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, UWA, Perth, Australia, May 25 – Jul 1
Times Square, New York, May 1 – Jun 1
Fullframe Kunst Film Festival, Vienna, Austria, Apr 19

2011

Big Screen Plaza, New York, Dec 12, 2011 – Jan 31, 2012
MdM Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria, Jul 16 – Oct 16
International Festival of Photography, Knokke-Heist, Belgium, Apr 9 – Jun 13
Timken Museum of Art, San Diego, Feb 25 – May 15
Instituto Moreira Salles, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Feb 15 – May 15
Portsmouth Museum of Art, Portsmouth, NH, Jan 26 – Apr 24
Air France A380, First Class Gallery

2010

Museum Kampa, Prague, Czech Republic, Nov 14, 2010 – Feb 6, 2011
Jiří Švestka Gallery, Prague, Czech Republic, Nov 12, 2010 – Jan 22, 2011
Santander Cultural, Porto Alegre, Brazil, Sep 8 – Dec 5
Akademie der Künste, Berlin, Germany, Aug 26 – Sep 12
ZKM | Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe, Germany, May 13 – Aug 22
Galerie Thomas Schulte, Berlin, Germany, Jan 29 – Mar 27

2009

Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany, Oct 16, 2009 – Jan 10, 2010
Phoenix Hallen, Hamburg, Germany, Oct 16, 2009 – Jan 10, 2010
Rivellino di Leonardo da Vinci, Locarno, Switzerland, Aug 1 – 31
Neue Galerie am Landesmuseum Joanneum, Graz, Austria, Jun 19 – Sep 6
Hydra School Project, Hydra, Greece, Jun 15 – Sep 15
Palazzo Reale, Milan, Italy, Jun 15 – Oct 4
Museo de la Pasión, Las Francesas, and San Benito, Valladolid, Spain, Apr 2 – May 31
The Fabric Workshop and Museum, Philadelphia, Feb 13 – Mar 22
Bernice Steinbaum Gallery, Miami, Feb 7 – Mar 12

2008

Art Miami (Bernice Steinbaum Gallery), Miami, Dec 2 – 7
Devin Borden Hiram Butler Gallery, Houston, Dec 2, 2008 – Feb 1, 2009
SESC Pinheiros, São Paulo, Brazil, Nov 12, 2008 – Feb 1, 2009
National Museum of Singapore, Singapore, Oct 29, 2008 – Jan 4, 2009
International Audiovisual Festival of Performing Arts, Lisbon, Portugal, Sep 21
Palazzo Leti Sansi, Spoleto Festival, Spoleto, Italy, Jun 29 – Jul 13
Bass Museum of Art, Miami Beach, May 3 – Aug 3
Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, Apr 5 – Aug 10
International Festival of Films on Art (FIFA), Montreal, Canada, Mar 6 – 16
Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, NC, Feb 23 – Jul 6
CSPS Gallery, Cedar Rapids, IA, Feb 2 – Mar 30
University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City, IA, Feb 2 – Mar 30

2007

Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Donnaregina (MADRE), Naples, Italy, Oct 11 – Dec 8
Ekaterina Foundation, Moscow, Russia, Oct 2 – Dec 2
Triumph Gallery, Moscow, Russia, Sep 28
Ace Gallery, Los Angeles, Feb 22 – Jul 31
Phillips de Pury & Co., New York, Jan 17 – Feb 14
Paula Cooper Gallery, New York, Jan 13 – Feb 3

2005

P.S.1, New York, Oct 2005