Shooting Painting, 1961

Niki de Saint Phalle

Narrator: The “shooting paintings” were Niki de Saint Phalle’s major breakthrough. Various kinds of containers filled with paint were covered by layers of plaster. de Saint Phalle then fired a rifle at them, causing the paint to splatter like blood.
 
These shootings often took the form of spectacular performances. This particular shooting painting was made in a gravel pit outside Stockholm when Niki de Saint Phalle was invited to Moderna Museet to take part in a group exhibition, Movement in Art, in 1961.
 
She writes:
“I shot because it was fun, and it made me feel great.
I shot because I was fascinated to watch the painting bleed and die.
I shot for that moment of magical ecstasy.”
 
Another bleeding work – Painting Made by Dancing – was created at the preview party for Movement in Art, held at the Arenateatern in Stockholm. Niki de Saint Phalle had found a theatre backdrop and attached small paint-filled plastic bags to it. She placed it on the floor, covering it with a plastic sheet and a carpet. When the guests danced on it, the paint was smeared.

Later that night, her artist friend Robert Rauschenberg, who also participated in the exhibition, carried the backdrop into the street, where passing cars left their tyre prints on it. This work is also in the Moderna Museet collection.