Old Masters in New Frames
Film Series Explores the Lives of Artists at
The Clark in Williamstown this Fall

The Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute is offering a free film series featuring well-regarded feature films about seven famous artists.  Older students interested in art, art history, and film can learn about artists from varying time periods and artistic styles, and each screening will include an introduction and post-film discussion with museum curators and art educators.

Topics presented in the films include artist Andrei Tarkovsky and the history of medieval Russia, Italian Baroque painting and portraiture, and the art and life of Vincent Van Gogh (used to illustrate a film adaptation of Irving Stone’s novel Lust for Life).

While the focus of each screening is on a particular artist, their passionate lives and the history of their form of expression and/or the context within which their life and work took place, the film series offers a unique opportunity for older students to learn about periods of history not often included in traditional school history curricula.  The films themselves are also a valuable way to learn – learners who best absorb information when visuals are presented will enjoy the creative and aesthetically pleasing and dramatic ways in which information is conveyed.

Screenings will take place on Thursday evenings beginning September 20th at 7pm, and admission is free.  The Clark Institute is located at 225 South Street, Williamstown, MA.  For more information, call 413-458-2303. www.clarkart.edu

• September 20 Thursday 7:00 pm: Andrei Rublev.  (1966, 205 min, Russian with subtitles)  Andrei Tarkovsky’s masterful epic explores not just the life and work of the famous icon painter, but the whole cosmos of late medieval Russia, in a cinematic classic of art, faith, and history.  Steve Satullo, film programmer for the Clark, will introduce the series and the film.  For the convenience of viewers, this film will be repeated on Friday 9/21, with Part One at 1:00 pm and Part Two at 3:00 pm.
• October 4 Thursday 7:00 pm: The Mill & the Cross.  (2011, 95 min.)  Lech Majewski offers a unique portal — through special effects and dramatization — for entering the world of a Pieter Bruegel painting, with the artist himself (played by Rutger Hauer) as guide.  Keith Moxey, Chair of Art History at Barnard College and former Robert Sterling Clark Visiting Professor at Williams College, will provide context and commentary on the film.
• October 18 Thursday 7:00 pm: Caravaggio.  (1986, 90 min.)  Derek Jarman’s bold experiment in portraiture tells the story of the scandalous Italian Baroque painter, played by Nigel Terry, with his muse and model played by Tilda Swinton.  Michael Cassin, director of the Clark‘s Center for Education in the Visual Arts, will tell tales about the painter and his world.
• November 1 Thursday 7:00 pm: Edvard Munch.  (1974, 172 min.).   Peter Watkins’ brilliant docudrama follows the early life and career of the grim Norwegian painter, showing what led to The Scream.  Jay Clarke, Manton Curator of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs for the Clark and author of Becoming Edvard Munch: Influence, Anxiety, and Myth, will introduce and assess the film.
• November 15 Thursday 7:00 pm: Lust for Life.  (1956, 122 min.)  Vincente Minnelli’s adaptation of the Irving Stone novel is an unusually serious Hollywood biopic, imbued with the colors of Vincent Van Gogh’s art and life.  Kirk Douglas gives an impassioned performance as Van Gogh, with Anthony Quinn as Paul Gauguin.  Perspective will be provided by Richard Kendall, Curator at Large for the Clark and author of Van Gogh’s Van Goghs.