Tag Archives: Edgar Degas

Visual Arts

PHIL GRABSKY AND EXHIBITION ON SCREEN

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I spoke with Phil Grabsky over a coffee at the lovely Kawa cafe in Surry Hills. Grabsky is the producer of the excellent documentary series. Exhibition on Screen.

This year Exhibition on Screen is in its sixth season and features Degas- Passion for Perfection from 6th June, Young Picasso from the 1st of August, Rembrandt from the National Gallery London and Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam  from 26th September, and Van Gogh in Japan from 21st November. The Rembrandt film is coming back by popular demand, bearing in mind this year is the 350th anniversary of his death.

In previous years Grabsky has covered many of the great artists. Season  One featured Monet, Munch, Vermeer and Leonardo. Season Two featured Matisse, Rembrandt, Girl with a Pearl Earring and other treasures from the Mauritshuis, Vincent Van Gogh: A new way of Seeing and The Impressionists and the Man Who Made Them. Season Three featured Goya: Visions of Flesh and Blood, Renoir- Revered and Reviled, and Painting the Modern Garden; Monet to Matisse. Season Four- The Curious World of Hieronymus Bosch, I, Claude Monet, the Artist’s Garden- American Impressionism and Michelangelo: Love and Death. Season Five: Canaletto and the Art Of Venice, David Hockney at the Royal Academy of Arts and Cezanne- Portraits Of A Life. Continue reading PHIL GRABSKY AND EXHIBITION ON SCREEN →

Cinema, Exhibitions, Visual Arts

EXHIBITION ON SCREEN : DEGAS : PASSION FOR PERFECTION

EXHIBITION ON SCREEN, the pioneering series of cinematic films about exhibitions, galleries and artists returns for a sixth season with Degas: Passion for Perfection, in cinemas across Australia from 6 June 2019. Directed by David Bickerstaff, the film journeys from a superb exhibition at The Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, where the UK’s most extensive Degas collection is held, to Paris and Italy, where Degas spent his formative years and taught himself to paint.

DEGAS : PASSION FOR PERFECTION offers a unique insight into Degas’ personal and creative life, looking at his relationship with the impressionist movement, fascination with dance, and struggle with his eyesight, which in time would prevent him from making art altogether. Continue reading EXHIBITION ON SCREEN : DEGAS : PASSION FOR PERFECTION →

Ballet, Sydney Festival 2019, Theatre

THE NUTCRACKER AND I : A SUBLIME AND ENCHANTING EXPERIENCE

 

The Nutcracker and I, by Alexandra Dariescu, with ballerina Désirée Ballantyne, animations by Yeast Culture, and choreography by Jenna Lee. Photo by Mark Allen

Blending a piano rendition of Tchaikovky’s romantic melodies with 35,000 digital images and a live ballerina THE NUTCRACKER AND I produces a purely enjoyable and magical creation. Having both a world renowned concert pianist and ballerina performing against constantly changing colourful backgrounds and characters is a sublime and enchanting experience.

The production of THE NUTCRACKER AND I is quite beautiful but an unusual format. Images are projected onto a see-through black gauze screen at the front of the stage. Pianist Alexandra Dariescu and ballerina Désirée Ballantyne are illuminated behind the screen. The images tell the classical Nutcracker story. Snow is falling as the Silberhaus family decorates their Christmas tree. The magician and toymaker Drosselmeyer arrives. Presents are exchanged including a nutcracker. Clara’s dream that night includes the nutcracker fighting with the Mouse King before being transformed into a prince. The familiar story continues with matching images, both static and dynamic, on screen.                                               Continue reading THE NUTCRACKER AND I : A SUBLIME AND ENCHANTING EXPERIENCE →

Cinema, Visual Arts

Exhibition on Screen -The Impressionists

Impressionists-inset

This is a dazzling, gloriously photographed film documenting an amazing exhibtion jointly curated by three major international museums. It looks at the work of the major Impressionists (Monet, Manet ,Cezanne, Degas, Sisley, Renoir, Cassatt, Morisot et al). Who were they behind the public face of their works? What is the story behind their works?How and why exactly did they paint? What is the source of their enduring appeal? What inspired them? All these questions and more are answered in this stunning film.

Part of the broader ‘Exhibition on Screen’ series, THE IMPRESSIONISTS AND THE MAN WHO MADAE THEM is a hugely insightful documentary. The exhibition debuted in Paris’s Musée du Luxembourg last October, is finishing today at  London’s National Gallery and next moves on to the  Philadelphia Museum of Art between this June and September. Continue reading Exhibition on Screen -The Impressionists →