Complexes

Anna Netrebko – ein Leben für die Oper

September 2021 •German

She is one of the greatest divas of the present day and has left her mark on the world of opera: Anna Netrebko. On her 50th birthday, ARTE is dedicating a special portrait to her. As a disciplined professional in preparations and behind the scenes. And very personally in a private conversation. An encounter with a true superstar of classical music.

Max Bill: The Master's Vision

August 2008 •German

The film about Max Bill (1908-1994) moves between the dynamic fields of art, aesthetics and politics. Max Bill was probably the most important swiss artist of the 20th century and the most famous student to come out of the legendary Bauhaus in Dessau. He was an ardent anti-fascist and all his avant-garde work as an artist, sculptor, architect and typographer showed a social responsibility and environmental awareness right through his life. His views have become incredibly topical.

Rebellion

April 2023 •English

In April 2019, Extinction Rebellion blocks strategic traffic points in London for days, leading to the arrest of hundreds of nonviolent protesters. Rebellion works, responds international climate lawyer Farhana Yamin, seeming almost surprised when the government agrees to their demand to declare a climate emergency.

Two Pence Magic

October 1929 •German

Two Penny Magic (Zweigroschenzauber) starting off with a little magic trick. It then presents an array of images from swimmers, bicyclers, murderers, airplanes in flight, boxers, lovers, runners, becoming in the end a collection of images in a magazine.

Lucebert, Time and Farewell

September 1994 •English

Three-part film about the Dutch painter and poet Lucebert who died in 1994. Director Johan van der Keuken made three short films about his friend and inspiration Lucebert. The black-and-white film Lucebert, dichter-schilder was shot in 1962 on a very low budget. In 1967 Een film voor Lucebert was released. Unlike Van der Keuken's first film about Lucebert, this one had a political message. It is a film for an artist about the world. Lucebert died in May 1994. A reaction to his death is contained in Als je weet waar ik ben zoek me dan. In this film, shot in Lucebert's studio, the presence of the artist is evoked once more through his absence. In Lucebert, Time and Farewell, Van der Keuken puts the three films together into a new entity that exploits the tension between changing and standing still over a period of 32 years.

Conz. The ultimate collector's life

October 2021 •Italian

The story of one of the most controversial characters in art collecting whose name continues to provoke and divide. Francesco Conz tried to exceed the border between art and life. An entrepreneur from Veneto, in the mid-1970s he decided to give up everything he had to devote himself with great determination to his devouring passion for the artistic avant-gardes of the second half of the twentieth century, which would turn into a real obsession until the tragic ending.

Not For Sale: Feminism and Art in the USA during the 1970s

January 1998 •English

Living Sculptures: Film Study for Screen Artist

May 1903 •German

A nude couple pose in an art studio on a square rug, while the camera does a circular traveling around them; the woman has her right knee on the floor and her right arm raised in front of her face, holding the man's thighs with her right, while the man is bent forward, as if looking in the distance.

Our Stories, Ourselves

April 2013 •Portuguese

Sixty-six adolescents, residents of Favela da Maré, were selected to participate in a dance show led by the choreographer Ivaldo Bertazzo, which incorporated their own daily experiences. Ten years later, directors David Meyer and Helena Soldberg search for some of the participants of this experience.

Eyeblink

March 1966 •English

A 16 mm film, featuring Yoko Ono's own eye slowly blinking, shot by Peter Moore with a high-speed camera at 2,000 frames per second, which is projected at normal speed, 24 frames per second, thus creating a slow-motion effect.

The Ghost Army

May 2013 •English

During World War II, a hand-picked group of American GI's undertook a bizarre mission: create a traveling road show of deception on the battlefields of Europe, with the German Army as their audience. The 23rd Headquarters Special Troops used inflatable rubber tanks, sound trucks, and dazzling performance art to bluff the enemy again and again, often right along the front lines. Many of the men picked to carry out these dangerous deception missions were artists. Some went on to become famous, including fashion designer Bill Blass. In their spare time, they painted and sketched their way across Europe, creating a unique and moving visual record of their war. Their secret mission was kept hushed up for nearly 50 years after the war's end.

Andy Warhol's Silver Flotations

January 1966 •English

Andy Warhol's Silver Flotations is a portrait of Warhol's famous installation of floating silver helium-filled balloons at the Leo Castelli Gallery in 1966. Willard Maas's lyrical "film poem" is the only visual document of this seminal exhibition.

Intervals

January 1973 •English

A short film which has its emphasis on back street walls with peeling posters and the constant pedestrian traffic in the foreground. It has a static camera positioned in front of the walls; experimental editing techniques, no dialogue-just background music, and quick edits of blackness throughout.

Tim's Vermeer

December 2013 •English

Tim Jenison, a Texas based inventor, attempts to solve one of the greatest mysteries in all art: How did Dutch Master Johannes Vermeer manage to paint so photo-realistically 150 years before the invention of photography? Spanning a decade, Jenison's adventure takes him to Holland, on a pilgrimage to the North coast of Yorkshire to meet artista David Hockney, and eventually even to Buckingham Palace. The epic research project Jenison embarques on is as extraordinary as what he discovers.

Brush of Baphomet

March 2009 •English

A look at the artwork of Aleister Crowley.

Cezanne

January 1978 •English

A film record of an exhibition of the late work of Paul Cezanne, organized by The Museum of Modern Art and the Reunion des Musees Nationaux in Paris. The camera moves across details of paintings, as well as details of Cezanne’s studio, providing an intimage, close-up view of the artist’s work. The narration is provided by Cezanne’s own words, taken directly from records of correspondence. 22nd Annual San Francisco International Film Festival Participation- Communication Competition, 1978.

Totems and Taboos

December 2018 •French

In Brussels, Belgium, the Royal Museum of Central Africa is undertaking a radical renovation, both physical and ethical, to show with sincerity, crudeness and open-mindedness the reality of the atrocities perpetrated against the inhabitants of the Belgian colonies in Africa, still haunted and traumatized by the ghost of King Leopold II of Belgium, a racist and genocidal tyrant.

A Tour of the Louvre

October 2021 •French

The tumultuous history of the Louvre Museum, founded in 1793, and its fabulous art collections, an immortal testimony to the destiny of France and all of Europe.

Mudflat

August 1980 •English

Years ago, artists would walk around the muck at the edge of the San Francisco Bay in Emeryville, and build loads of sculptures out there on the flats, created from driftwood and found objects that drivers would enjoy as they motored south on the old Highway 17 (known in numerous radio ads as 'Highway 17, The Nimitz'). Grabbing material off someone else’s work was considered fair game and part of the fun, and contributed a kinetic dynamic to the ongoing display. Now the place is a park, and the sculptures are gone, but you can see what it used to be like in this neat and funny documentary by Ric Reynolds, augmented by Erich Seibert’s wonderful musique-concrète/time-lapse sequences. The flashback circus sequence includes Scott Beach and Bill Irwin. Sculptors interviewed include Walt Zucker, Tony Puccio, Robert Sommer, Ron & Mary Bradden, and Bob Kaminsky.

David Hockney: Joiner Photographs

July 1983 •English

David Hockney is unquestionably one of the most passionate and versatile experimental artists on the contemporary scene. In the late 1970s the British artist developed a pioneering concept which also changed his perspective on painting – his “joiners”. In this film, the artist himself talks about this photographic approach, a kind of Cubism-inspired photocollage which explores the space-time continuum. Hockney allows the viewer to share in the creative “joiner” process and leads us step by step into the universe of his artistic creativity.