Website Evaluation & Comparison: Pipilotti Rist and Hermann Nitsch

In this post I will be comparing the websites of Pippi Lotti Rist and Hermann Nitsch.  I will be looking at the design, layout, colour palette, typography and also technical aspects such as navigation, ease of use, presentation of galleries and how easy it is to use the site and understand the artist.

Pipilotti Rist

I will begin with Pipilotti Rist website, a video and perfomance artist. On the homepage there is a full page of video stills that move through different images.  The artist name is in the left hand corner in large letters and is static, there is no header or footer and there is no navigation bar...I clicked hopefully on the screen but that led nowhere so I found one button that said 'contact' at the bottom of the screen and this has a small menu.

I clicked on 'Galleries' in the contact button and this just has a list of galleries where the artist work is shown. The next menu item is copyright and images and this just list copyright for her work, then there is a list of distributers.  This is all there is, this is now the shortest evaluation of any website I have ever done.  There is no work to look at here and there is not even links to guide you to other works, there is no copyright notice on the site with a date.  A very very disappointing experience.

Hermann Nitsch

The second site I am looking at is Hermann Nitsch another performance artist (Vienna Actionist).  Hermann Nitsch's Homepage is bold black writing in the header with the artists name in sans serif font, in large letters.  Underneath this is had the 'Das Origien Mysterien Theater' again in in big bold black sans serif letters. Below this is the navigation bar.  The whole page has a white clean background.  Underneath teh navigation bar is a gallery grid 2 x 6 with different areas these are: Biography, Painting Actions, Actions, Music, Events and Publications.  In the footer there is a privacy and legal notice, these are well writtien and clear notice which outline the scope of privacy and legal requirements in relation to Nitsch's site and work.  There is no copyright date to the website on the footer or on the homepage that I can find. The homepage is bold and clear and clearly the links to all ages work well.

The site can be viewed in either German or English and it is easy to switch between the two as the language in in the navigation bar and in the footer.  I clicked first into the Action Paimtings box and this is the page I was led to 

his has a very long essay on these paintings and their origins with the three images at the top as shown here. There is also am additional menu and regsiter of action painting is lierally a register of all teh action paintings and where they have been carried out as a record.  Then selected painting actions leads to another page with these selected works which you can click into as seen below.  you can also click through the gallery here.

There is many other pages that are too many to list here but one of these is graphic works and this again has three images and an essay on these works. 

The pages are very consistent, there is excellent navigation through the pages and there is so much work to see throughout with many galleries . In the Orgies Mysteries Theatre the page is laid out the same with three images and an essay 

This also has a sub-navigation menu with again register of actions, selected action and 6-Day Play - the mysteries threatre are longer more intense works involving many performers as can be seen in the more detailed image below.

The next page that I looked at was biography - again the same consistent layout with three images at the top of the page and then the writing underneath. This is a long life in chronological order, it is something you would read with a large cup of coffee!  There is much to read throughout this site and if you are really interested in the artists there is a wealth of information.  I have been scrolling down to the bottom of each page and I realised there is no back to top button - this would actually have been really useful on this site. 

There is much to learn on this site but what is missing is perhaps videos of these events and performances, I checked on YouTube and there are videos of some of these events and they could have been included.  Overall this site is consistent, with good navigation and back buttons, it is available in two languages and does give a good account of the artist (now deceased Hermann Nitsch 1938-2022).  

Comparison

The two websites I looked at are so wildly different in design that this comparision is a little challenging. Pipilotti Rist site had essently nothing on it at all, it listed galleries where here work could be viewed and copyrights but nothing else.  I could see no work, there was no links to work and overall is basically completely unhelpful as a site to know and understand the artist and her work.  Hermann Nitsch, on the other hand, was full of informtion there were many pages all full of different informaton about different areas if his work and.  There are long essays and explanations on each page and a very full and lengthy biography, there is a list of publications and contacts include a link to the Nitsch Foundation Website, this was also great and contained loads of additional information and work I could view.  I really don't think there is a comparison here as such as the Rist site just does not contain anything whereas Nitsch attempts to contain everything, perhaps that is very much represents teh artist as he was fairly uncontainable! The website here is well presented, clean, easy to navigate with the exception of not including back to top buttons on long written pages.  Some may not enjoy the long written pieces, in this age of people who do not read and want instant information, however I like the slow read and know that I will learn something important from this.