Shooting Picture
- Artist: Niki de Saint Phalle
- Date: 1961
- Medium: Plaster, paint, string, polythene and wire on wood
- Dimensions: object: 1430 x 780 x 81 mm
- Museum: Tate Modern
- Collection record: Tate Modern website
Listen to the free audio guide
About this artwork
This is the Shooting Picture by Niki de Saint Phalle, created in 1961. The piece is a thick plaster relief that looks like a flat wall, but underneath you find polythene bags packed with bright paint. The surface is covered in white plaster, giving it a raw, almost blank canvas feel. When it first appeared, the artist invited people to shoot at it with a gun. The bullets punch through the plaster, breaking the bags and letting the paint pour out in chaotic splashes of red, blue, yellow and black. The act of shooting became part of the artwork itself – a performance that turns chance into visual drama. Notable participants were American artists Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns, who fired at the piece during its 1961 Paris show. The result is a living record of energy, explosion and the thrill of spontaneous creation.
See it in person
Shooting Picture is in the collection of Tate Modern on Bankside, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
