Since December 2020, the historic sign of the Plaza cinema has been regularly renewed to challenge passers-by with phrases inspired by or taken from the films that were screened in the former Plaza cinema. Indeed, Christian Robert-Tissot draws on the repertoire of 890 films screened at the Plaza from its opening in 1952 to its closure in 2004.
True to this cinematographic heritage, these phrases acquire a completely different resonance once transposed into the urban space and the current context. For this episode, the Geneva artist seizes a cult phrase from the film Pierrot le Fou, the tenth feature film directed by Jean-Lux Godard in 1965.
“WHAT CAN I DO, I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO DO”
Pierrot le Fou, 1965, a film by Jean-Luc Godard
Pursued by gangster, Ferdinand (Jean-Paul Belmondo) and Marianne (Anne Karina) flee towards the sea… “What can I do? I don’t know what to do”, repeats Anna Karina as she walks along the beach, her feet in the water.
The film’s crime plot is merely a pretext for a narrative that disregards logic and unfolds through creative intuitions. A cinematic poem whose shifts iin rhythm, jump cuts, quotations, and collages create an impression of total freedom.
With our feet in the water, like Anna Karina, we walk… but the state of the world compels us to ask: what can we do? The line resonates in two ways: within the film, it expresses existential boredom. In reality, it reveals our distress, our disbelief in the face of an alarming global situation.
This reflection lies at the heart of the thirteen installation of From Below (see the full series), a series by artist Christian Robert-Tissot. Displayed on the neon sign of the Plaza in 2025, more than half a century after Pierrot le Fou, the questions we ask ourselves reveal our exhaustion.
Photo credits: © Nicolas Lieber