Lisa Birke

Additional Information

red carpet follows its female subject (the artist herself), elegantly attired in a glittering black gown and three-inch heels, as she sashays down a seemingly-endless red carpet. The carpet cuts through an ever-changing Canadian landscape: through forests and fields, over a fallen log, across streams and riverbeds, uphill and downhill, through snowbanks, and upon sandy beaches. Our heroine falters and struggles to maintain her composure as she traverses this difficult terrain, an enchanting, tragicomic, and ultimately critical gesture that responds to tropes of representation of women in art history, cinema, and popular culture.

Lisa Birke is a Canadian artist whose work is situated between traditions of painting, digital video, and performance art. She is a recent MFA graduate from the University of Waterloo (2013). Birke has had solo exhibitions, performances, and screenings across Canada and her short films and videos have been presented at festivals internationally.

Lisa Birke, red carpet (red stripe painting; walking the line), 2012-13, digital video loop, 20:00. Image courtesy of the artist and Vtape.