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CULTURAL/EVENTS AGENDA
MARCH 2010
This agenda presents a selection of French or French-related events in the Midwest.
For a complete calendar of events for the French and French-speaking associations
in your area, please visit their respective web sites.
Agenda culturel pour la région de Chicago / Cultural Agenda for the Chicago area: "LIAISON" |
THIS MONTH'S MAIN EVENT...
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MARCH 20 - JUNE 20: MATISSE - RADICAL INVENTION, 1913-1917
Art Institute of Chicago - Regenstein Hall
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MARCH 5 AT 8 PM: ORCHESTRE PHILARMONIQUE DE RADIO FRANCE |
Très magnifique! The Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, famous for its distinctive French sound, offers an all-Ravel program led by its gifted music director Myung-Whun Chung and featuring internationally acclaimed mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter singing Shéhérazade. She “brilliantly conveys the exotic allure of Ravel’s mesmerizing score.” —The Independent
Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
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MARCH 5 AT 6PM : FESTIVAL DE LA FRANCOPHONIE - SOIREE COMMUNE
The Alliance Française of Chicago and our Francophone friends in Chicago invite you to an evening of music, food, fun and surprises. La Francophonie represents a carnaval of cultures spanning the continents from Marrakesh to Montréal and from Toulouse to Tahiti. Join us to sample food, dance to the music and try your luck at our raffle on Friday March 5, the kick off evening to our month long-celebration of la Francophonie. Bienvenue à tous, et que la fête commence! Complete information. |
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FESTIVAL DE LA FRANCOPHONIE : SOIREE FRANCAISE
Don't miss the Soirée France with best-selling French author Delphine de Vigan!
Monday, March 08, 2010 at 6:30 p.m. at the Alliance française - 54 W. Chicago Ave. Free admission. |
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On the International Women’s Day, the Cultural Services of the French Consulate in Chicago invite you to come and spend an evening with Delphine de Vigan, short-listed for the 2009 prix Goncourt and best selling author of “No et moi”, an intense, brilliant novel about home and homelessness. Translated in 20 languages and winner of Le Prix des Libraires, “No et moi” is currently being made into a movie. |
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The US Tour is organized by the Délégation Générale de l’Alliance Française aux États-Unis and the Cultural services at the Consulate general of France in Chicago in collaboration with the Rotary Club Paris Academy and with the generous support of the Jean Bodfish Brown Fund.
Sponsored in part by the Cultural Services of Consulate General of France in Chicago. |
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13TH ANNUAL EUROPEAN UNION FILM FESTIVAL
MARCH 5 - APRIL 1
The European Union Film Festival, was founded by the Gene Siskel Film Center in 1998. The annual festival program of more than 60 feature films, all Chicago premieres, ranges from work by established directors, including some of the most renowned names in world cinema, to the work of first-time and emerging directors and films from nations with developing film industries. Complete information.
THIS YEAR'S FRENCH FILMS INCLUDE :
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AROUND A SMALL MOUNTAIN / 36 VUES DU PIC SAINT LOUP
2009, Jacques Rivette, France/Italy
With Jane Birkin, Sergio Castellitto
Sunday, March 28, 3:00 pm and Monday, March 29, 6:00 pm
BLUEBEARD / BARBE BLEUE
2009, Catherine Breillat, France
W ith Lola Créton, Dominique Thomas
Saturday, March 13, 7:30 pm and Thursday, March 18, 6:15 pm
DISENGAGEMENT / DÉSENGAGEMENT
2008, Amos Gitai, France/Israel
With Juliette Binoche, Liron Levo
Sunday, March 21, 5:15 pm and Monday, March 22, 6:00 pm
FATHER OF MY CHILDREN / LE PÈRE DE MES ENFANTS
2009, Mia Hansen-Løve, France
With Louis-Do Lencquesaing, Chiara Caselli
Sunday, March 14, 2:45 pm and Wednesday, March 17, 8:00 pm
FRENCH GIGOLO / CLIENTE
2008, Josiane Balasko, France
With Nathalie Baye, Eric Caravaca
Sunday, March 7, 3:00 pm and Thursday, March 11, 6:00 pm
HADEWIJCH
2009, Bruno Dumont, France
Julie Sokolowski, Yassine Salime
Saturday, March 27, 7:15 pm and Wednesday, March 31, 6:00 pm
JUST ANYBODY / LE PREMIER VENU
2008, Jacques Doillon, France
With Clémentine Beaugrand, Gérald Thomassin
Friday, March 19, 6:00 pm and Wednesday, March 24, 7:45 pm
LET IT RAIN / PARLEZ-MOI DE LA PLUIE
2008, Agnès Jaoui, France
With Jean-Pierre Bacri, Agnès Jaoui
Friday, March 12, 6:00 pm and Monday, March 15, 6:00 pm
OSS 117: LOST IN RIO / OSS 117: RIO NE RÉPOND PLUS
2009, Michel Hazanavicius, France
With Jean Dujardin, Louise Monot
Friday, March 26, 6:00 pm and Saturday, March 27, 3:00 pm |
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MATISSE - RADICAL INVENTION, 1913-1917
MARCH 20 - JUNE 20
This groundbreaking exhibition presents the first sustained examination of one of the most important periods of Matisse’s career—the years in which he labored over the Art Institute’s monumental and mysterious Bathers by a River among other works. Merging new art historical and archival information with new scientific technologies, Matisse: Radical Invention, 1913–1917 offers a fresh look at this modern master’s most ambitious and inspiring work. Rigorously purged of descriptive detail, sharply composed, and dominated by the colors black and gray, the works Matisse produced between late 1913 and 1917 are among his most demanding, experimental, and enigmatic. Though Matisse himself identified two canvases from this time—Bathers by a River and The Moroccans—as among his most “pivotal,” scholars have typically described these and other works of the period as singular responses to Cubism or World War I, disconnected from the rest of his artistic career. |
Henri Matisse. Bathers by a River, 1909, 1913, 1916. Charles H. and Mary F. S. Worcester Collection. © 2010 Succession H. Matisse / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. |
This original exhibition is the first to offer an in-depth exploration of Matisse’s work from this important period, revealing fascinating information about his working methods, experimental techniques, and compositional choices, uncovered through extensive new historical, technical, and scientific research undertaken at the Art Institute and the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Powerfully representing this remarkable aspect of his career are nearly 120 paintings, sculptures, drawings, and prints from around the world. Also on display are the artist’s innovative etchings, engravings, and monotypes—prints made only during this period—as well as the little-known series “Civil Prisoners of Bohain-en-Vermandois” which demonstrates how the artist attempted to unite art, life, and wartime concerns in the early 20th century.
Art Institute of Chicago - Regenstein Hall |
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TRACING PROUST
THROUGH MAY 23
Marcel Proust (1871-1922) has been called the greatest novelist of the twentieth century. The Rare Book & Manuscript Library and the Kolb-Proust Archive together own one of the world's leading research collections of Marcel Proust materials. This exhibition includes original manuscripts, correspondence, and prints from these collections that expose traces of the compositional process, revealing the creative play of Proust's artistry and the artist himself. Guest Curators: Caroline Szylowicz and Chatham Ewing. Exhibition sponsored by Illinois Arts Council, a State Agency; Krannert Art Museum Director's Circle; and Krannert Art Museum Council.
Krannert Art Museum - University of Illinois at Urbana. |
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RFI IN THE UNITED STATES
RFI has signed an agreement with AudioNow to broadcast its French programs on the telephone network, 24 hours a day, in 5 American cities: Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, Miami and New York City. You can now listen to RFI in Chicago by calling the following phone number (only local charges will apply): 312.646.7684. On November 15 2009, 6 more U.S. cities will be added to the list including, New Orleans, Lafayette, Dallas, Seattle, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Washington D.C. where RFI will be available 24 hours a day in French. Read the press release. |
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MORE EVENTS
Agenda culturel pour la région de Chicago / Cultural Agenda for the Chicago area: LIAISON
Evénements économiques / Economic Events: ECONOMIE/BUSINESS |
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NEWS AND NIGHTMARES: HOMER, ERNST, AND WOOD ENGRAVING
THROUGH JUNE 13
This exhibition looks at 19th-century wood engraved illustrations created for the mass media from the perspective of two radically different artists. From 1857 through the 1880s, Winslow Homer (American, 1836-1910) designed over 200 wood engravings for illustrated periodicals such as Harper’s Weekly. Homer’s drawn-on-the-spot illustrations depicted the public and private life of Americans, including their entertainments, holidays, and sports, as well as portraits of political figures and events, and images of the Civil War. In 1933, Max Ernst (French, born Germany, 1891-1976) cut up and recombined illustrated melodramatic and romantic 19th-century French periodicals to create his astonishing Surrealist collage novel. |
News & Nightmares includes 16 prints designed by Winslow Homer from the Art Center’s complete collection of Winslow Homer’s wood engravings. The exhibition also features 26 images from the Art Center’s recent acquisition, Max Ernst’s une semaine de bonté, ou les septs elements capitaux (A Week of Kindness, or the Seven Deadly Elements) 1934. Plese visit the website for other programs related to this exhibition.
Des Moines Art Center - Print Gallery.
Photo: Winslow Homer (American, 1836–1910) Thanksgiving Day—The Church. Published in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper on December 23, 1865. Electrotype from wood engraving, with typographic text on paper 13 15/16 x 9 3/16 inches (page); 15 7/8 x 10 3/4 inches (image) Gelman 156. Des Moines Art Center Permanent Collections; Gift of Richard and Kay Ward, 2003.110 |
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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF MASTERS: THE EVOLUTION OF THE REPRODUCTIVE PRINT
THROUGH MAY 23 |
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Spanning 500 years of Western printmaking history, In the Footsteps of Masters features approximately 80 reproductive prints from the 15th to the 20th century, including original prints and drawings by artists Albrecht Dürer, Annibale Carracci, Jusepe De Ribera, Edouard Manet, Jean-Baptiste Corot, Jean-Honoré Fragonard, William Blake, Francisco Goya, and Grant Wood, as well as reproductive prints made after the works of famous masters such as Raphael, Peter Paul Rubens, Rembrandt, Jan Vermeer, Jan Van Eyck, Titian, Michelangelo, and others.
Figge Art Museum - University of Iowa Museum |
| Photo: Cornelis Galle the Elder (Flemish; Antwerp, 1576-1650), Procne Showing Tereus the Head of his Child (after Peter Paul Rubens, Flemish; Antwerp, 1577-1640), c. 1637, Engraving, Museum purchase 1980.92 |
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THE GOLDENBERG DUO
MARCH 16 AT 7:30 PM
Sponsored by The Alliance Française de Kansas City and The UMKC French Club. This event will take place in Room 326 of the UMKC Performing Arts Center: 4949 Cherry Street - Kansas City and is free and open to the entire KC community.
For further information contact Prof. Gayle Levy at 816-235-2820 or levyg@umkc.edu. |
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KEYNOTE ADDRESS BY DR. EMMANUEL NGOMSI IN OBSERVANCE OF THE 40TH ANNUAL JOURNEE INTERNATIONAL DE LA FRANCOPHONIE
MARCH 21 FROM 5-6:30 PM
Dr. Ngomsi's lecture is entitled «La Francophonie: Une politique, une culture ou une philosophie?» and will deal with the place of the French language in today's world influenced by globalization as well as with the impact of the philosophy of "francophonie" on the politics and culture of a world in the midst of change. Lecture will be given in room 207 in Scofield Hall on the campus of UMKC and will be followed by an optional dinner at the Grand Street Cafe at 7:00 PM.
Please reserve before Thursday, March 18, at rsvp@afkc.org. Complete information. |
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MACHINE IN A VOID
MARCH 6-MAY 22
Several years in the making, the Spencer-organized Machine in a Void will present nearly 150 works of graphic art made during the years of the First World War (1914-1918), with a post-script on the art of the decade following the war. By invoking the perspective of primarily European artists, the exhibition will bring attention to the substantial roles played by the graphic arts during WWI (1914–1918) as a tool for official propaganda and as means of voicing individual responses to the war ranging from documentation to dissent.
The Spencer's collections are rich in works from France, Belgium and Germany and the exhibited artists include Otto Dix, Kerr Eby, George Grosz, Jules de Bruycker, Henri de Groux, André Devambez, Erich Heckel, Henri Ibels, Jean-Emile Laboureur, Karl Maes, Maxime Maufra, Ludwig Meidner, Robert Michel, Johannes Molzahn, Karl Schmidt-Rotluff, Georg Scholz, Max Slevogt, Edmond van Dooren, and, Jean Veber. Stephen Goddard, senior curator of prints & drawings, is organizing the exhibition following a sabbatical spent primarily in Germany and a fellowship at the Wolfsonian-Florida International University—one of the world’s great repositories for WWI-era material culture. In conjunction with the exhibition, the Spencer will offer programming that involves the campus and the community, including curricular initiatives at KU, a film/book series, children’s art classes, and social networking. A catalogue is planned.
Spencer Museum of Art |
Henry de Groux
1867-1930
born: St-Josse-ten-Noode, Belgium ; died: Marseille, France
Lanceur de granade (Grenade Thrower), 1914-1916
Le Visage de la Victoire
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BOOK DISCUSSION/FILM SERIES: A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet (2004)
MARCH 11 AT 7 PM
This collaborative program pairs film screenings at the Spencer with book discussions sponsored by the Lawrence Public Library. In conjunction with the exhibition Machine in a Void: World War I & The Graphic Arts, the Library has created a book discussion group on the subject, and the Spencer has assembled a series of films with storylines or themes similar to those found in the literature. A book discussion precedes each screening.
To register for the Book Discussion group, contact Maria Butler at (785) 843-3833 ext.123 or email mbutler@lawrence.lib.ks.us
Spencer Museum of Art Auditorium. |
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THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER: EUROPEAN DRAWINGS AND PRINTS FROM THE PULGRAM-MCSPARRAN
THROUGH MARCH 14
The Museum of Art has an outstanding collection of the graphic work of early 20th-century art, particularly the work of the German Expressionists. The present exhibition includes drawings and prints by artists such as George Grosz, whose Hogarthian critique of post-WWI Germany still sears the mind; Ernst Kirchner, a leading figure in Die Brücke and the German Expressionist movement; and Oskar Kokoschka, whose vigorous style is characteristic of the later generation of Expressionists. Among the group of works are less typical but lyrical landscapes by Kirchner, Lovis Corinth, and Erich Heckel. This second component of the Pulgram-McSparran Collection features the social commentary, bold graphic imagery, and delectation of the female form that is embodied in the work of outstanding European artists from roughly 1920 to 1950.
The University of Michigan Museum of Art – Ann Arbor |
Emil Nolde
Germany, 1867–1956 Actress
Watercolor on paper
Gift of the Ernst Pulgram and Frances McSparran Collection, 2007/2.102 |
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LANDSCAPES FROM THE AGE OF IMPRESSIONISM:
THROUGH APRIL 18
This exhibition includes many of the finest examples of mid-nineteenth through early twentieth-century French and American landscapes from the collection of the Brooklyn Museum of Art. The 38 paintings presented offer a broad survey of landscape painting as practiced by such leading French artists as Gustave Courbet and Claude Monet and their most significant American followers including Frederick Childe Hassam and John Singer Sargent. |
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The exhibition includes many American painters who, beginning at mid-century, followed in the footsteps of the French archetypes seeking to improve their skills and find inspiration in Paris and its environs, attending French art academies and frequenting the painting locations made famous by their Barbizon and Impressionist predecessors. Some of the Americans had direct contact with leading French landscape painters, sharing landscape sites or seeking informal guidance from admired mentors. The majority of the American paintings on display depict American locales: beaches, factories, tenements, and notable subjects such as Central Park in works distinguished by brilliant colors and lively, broken brushwork. Includes works by William Glackens, Julian Alden Weir, and Willard Leroy Metcalf.
Flint Institute of Art. |
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9TH FESTIVAL DU FILM FRANCOPHONE DE KALAMAZOO
MARCH 17-21
The FFFK is dedicated to the presentation of original creative cinema from the Francophone World.
Supported by the Cultural Services of the French Consulate in Chicago. Complete information. |
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MORE EVENTS
Agenda culturel pour la région de Chicago / Cultural Agenda for the Chicago area: LIAISON
Evénements économiques / Economic Events: ECONOMIE/BUSINESS |
CONFERENCE BY DELPHINE DE VIGAN: FROM "INTIMATE" WRITING TO THE SOCIAL NOVEL?
MARCH 10 AT 4:45 PM |
Delphine de Vigan will speak about her novelistic career, starting with autobiography, Jours sans faim (Days without Hunger) and so-called ‘intimate’ writing, Les jolis garçons (The Pretty Boys), Un soir de décembre (A December Evening), and concluding in two novels which are very grounded in the contemporary world, mirrors of violent and painful social reality No et moi (No and I) and Les heures souterraines (The Underground Hours). Can we necessary speak of the social novel? In order to answer this question, Delphine de Vigan will discuss the genesis of writing: how the idea for a novel comes about, the way in which she documents her work meetings, reading, assorted research) and the role played by this documentation in writing, the choice of narrative mode, the role of fiction, the relevance – or lack thereof – of the idea of political activism, etc.
In collaboration with the Rotary Club and the Délégation Générale of the Alliance Française in the United States, presented by the Alliance Française of Minneapolis/St. Paul and Macalester College. |
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THE FRENCH TROUBADOURS: TETE AND ERIC JOHN KAISER
MARCH 24 AT 7:30 PM
The Cedar Cutural Center and the Alliance Française de Minneapolis / Saint Paul present Tété and Eric John Kaiser for an unforgettable evening of French music. Part of Francophonie Month.
In collaboration with the Délégation Générale of the Alliance Française in the United States, presented by the Alliance Française of Minneapolis / St. Paul and the Cedar Cultural Center. |
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| FILMS AT THE WALKER ART CENTER |
35 SHOTS OF RUM / 35 RHUMS directed by Claire Denis (2008)
MARCH 12
A personal film about relationships and letting go, 35 Shots of Rum was inspired by the subtle, graceful work of Japanese filmmaker Ozu. Depicting a widowed father sharing an apartment with his adult daughter, the story is told in the pauses between their words. “Sublime . . . Denis’ warmest, most radiant work” (Village Voice). A provocative director recognized for her explorations of cross-cultural tensions, Denis was the subject of the Walker’s 1998 Regis Retrospective, and has screened two films at previous Women with Vision film festivals.
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LOURDES directed by Jessica Hausner (2009)
People flock to the purportedly miraculous healing waters in the French town of Lourdes when they think science has failed. Exploring religion and the origin of belief, Lourdes focuses on Christine (Sylvie Testud), wheelchair-bound with multiple sclerosis, who uses the pilgrimage to create a social life. “Hausner walks a tightrope . . . between medicine and the Madonna—and the result is an austere, measured, skeptical, sensitive film that lingers in the mind for days” (London Evening Standard). Winner of the FIPRESCI Prize, Venice Film Festival.
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LA BOHEME BY GIACOMO PUCCINI
MARCH 6-14
La bohème may be the world's most popular opera, and for good reason - it's the quintessential portrait of romance, high-spirited friendship, and the idealistic pursuit of love and art. James Valenti and Ellie Dehn, who lit up the stage in Romeo and Juliet, reunite in one cast, while Adam Diegel and Jennifer Black lead the other in this twin-cast spectacular, conducted by French conductor Emmanuel Joël-Hornak.
The Opera Minnesota |
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THE ROSE ENSEMBLE
MARCH 25 AT 7:30 PM |
“The rock stars of Renaissance vocal music” (New York Times) return to Minneapolis for the first time in ten years! Director Peter Phillips and The Tallis Scholars revitalize the dark sonorities, lush chords and complex textures of early music from Flanders and France. In this nationally-touring program, the famous ensemble presents a mass by Jean de Mouton, a Magnificat by Nicolas Gombert, and a beautiful choral Ave Maria by Josquin Desprez: rarely-heard works that define the high Renaissance style.
Basilica of Saint Mary |
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MORE EVENTS
Agenda culturel pour la région de Chicago / Cultural Agenda for the Chicago area: LIAISON
Evénements économiques / Economic Events: ECONOMIE/BUSINESS |
FACES BEHIND BARBED WIRE: THE RIVESALTES INTERNMENT CAMP MEMORIAL EXHIBITION
MARCH 21-MAY 6
OPENING MARCH 21 AT 1:30 - 4 PM: Keynote address, by Dr. Denis Peschanski, at 2pm |
Between 1938 and 1946, the French government interned 600,000 persons, men, women, children, elderly and the infirm. Spaniards, foreigners, gypsies, Jews, communists, prostitutes, black marketeers, suspects of collaboration and German civilians were held in these 200 camps created by the French government. For decades after the war this history was hidden from public view. The Rivesaltes internment camp is the only trace of this dark chapter in French history. During World War II, Rivesaltes was one of Southern France's main internment camps. The Rivesaltes military base, near the border with Spain, in fact holds a notorious place in French history as the camp was only closed in 1970. The Rivesaltes Internment Camp Memorial (which has been subject of profiles in the New York Times and Washington Post) will be the first Holocaust memorial in Southern France and the largest Holocaust memorial in Western Europe. Thousands of Jews were sent from Rivesaltes to Auschwitz. Many of them were children. This exhibition tells the story of Rivesaltes and those of who survived their internment there. The exhibition is based in part on the groundbreaking research of one of France's most acclaimed historians, Denis Peschanski. Photographs and documents have been generously provided by the Musée Mémorial du camp Rivesaltes and by a Holocaust survivor based here in St. Louis, Missouri. Rivesaltes survivor testimonies from Steven Spielberg's Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation will be screened at the exhibition. In June 2010, nearly 70 years later, these survivor testimonies filmed by Steven Spielberg's organization will be personally delivered by Rabbi Haziza-Sokol and Congregation Kol Am's leadership to the Director of the Holocaust Memorial at Rivesaltes in France. Faces Behind Barbed Wire includes original contributions by some of Europe's greatest writers and scholars, including Moris Farhi, Professor Alejandro Baer, and Academy Award winner Frederic Raphael.
Holocaust Museum and Learning Center |
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THE HORSE SHOW
THROUGH MAY 29
The Horse Show is an exhibition of horse objects from the Sheldon's remarkable collection of sculpture as well as two-dimensional holdings and sculpture on loan from private local collections. Included will be Deborah Butterfield's Derby Horse, Marino Marini's Horseman, and Boris Lovet-Lorski's On Parade (Stallions). Two additional folk art pieces, our 19th-Century Horse (Shop Sign) by an unknown artisan and Carousel Horse (Bessie), also from Sheldon's permanent collection. On loan from private collectors for the exhibition in the Great Hall will be Niki de Saint Phalle's Le Cheval et la Mariee (The Horse and the Bride) and Five Horses—Side by Side by Immi C. Storrs as well as another Butterfield, Gus, and Jean Pierre Larocque's Untitled Horse III.
Sheldon Museum of Art. |
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| FILMS AT MARY RIEPMA ROSS MEDIA ARTS CENTER |
SÉRAPHINE directed by Martin Provost (2009)
MARCH 12-18
SÉRAPHINE is the true story of Séraphine Louis aka Séraphine de Senlis (Yolande Moreau), a simple and profoundly devout housekeeper who in 1905 at age 41 — self-taught and with the instigation of her guardian angel — began painting brilliantly colorful canvases. In 1912 Wilhelm Uhde (Ulrich Tukur), a German art critic and collector — he was one of the first collectors of Picasso and champion of naïve primitive painter Le Douanier Rousseau — discovered her paintings while she worked for him as a maid in his lodgings in Senlis outside Paris. Uhde became her patron and grouped her work with other naïve painters – the so-called “Sacred Heart Painters” — with acclaimed shows in Paris, elsewhere in Europe and eventually at New York’s MOMA. Director Martin Provost builds his story around the relationship between the avant-garde art dealer and the visionary cleaning lady, forging a testament to the mysteries of creativity and the resilience of one woman’s spirit. A sleeper hit in France.
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LA DANSE - LE BALLET DE L'OPERA DE PARIS directed by Frederick Wiseman
MARCH 19-25
“Frederick Wiseman’s magnificent LA DANSE: THE PARIS OPERA BALLET offers a portrait of suppleness and agility — not just that of the dancers’ bodies but also of the august institution of the title. Like all of his documentaries, LA DANSE forgoes voice-over and identifying intertitles, allowing for spectators’ full immersion into the action within the walls of the Palais Garnier, the 19th-century, neo-Baroque opera house where the company rehearses and performs, while also demanding that we pay closer attention, with none of nonfiction film’s usual cues to guide us. Shown in a meeting discussing the finer distinctions between ‘benefactors’ and ‘big benefactors,’ Lefèvre nimbly tackles the potential messiness — but absolute necessity — of crass commerce fueling high art. When not administrating, Lefèvre seems happiest as a maternal martinet, reminding one new student, ‘To do is the most important.’” Melissa Anderson, L.A. Weekly . |
A TOWN CALLED PANIC directed By Stéphane Aubier & Vincent Patar
MARCH 26- APRIL 1st
Hilarious and frequently surreal, the stop-motion extravaganza A Town Called Panic has endless charms and raucous laughs for children from eight to eighty. Based on the Belgian animated cult TV series (which was released by Wallace & Gromit’s Aardman Studios), PANIC stars three plastic toys named Cowboy, Indian and Horse who share a rambling house in a rural town that never fails to attract the weirdest events. Cowboy and Indian’s plan to gift Horse with a homemade barbeque backfires when they accidentally buy 50 million bricks. Whoops! This sets off a perilously wacky chain of events as the trio travel to the center of the earth, trek across frozen tundra and discover a parallel underwater universe of pointy-headed (and dishonest!) creatures. A sort of Gallic Monty Python crossed with Art Clokey on acid, A Town Called Panic is zany, brainy and altogether insane-y!
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35 SHOTS OF RUM / 35 RHUMS directed by Claire Denis (2008)
STARTING MARCH 12
Lionel, a metro conductor, lives with his beautiful university student daughter Josephine in a bustling apartment complex. They have shared the same space for many years and have grown accustomed to one another's company. Lately, Josephine has been spending time with Noe, a handsome young neighbor, while Lionel is finding himself drawn into a romance with close friend Gabrielle. As their lives are pulled in different directions, father and daughter realize they must confront an aspect of their past in order to embrace what lies ahead. Sumptuously filmed, this gloriously delicate and sublime new film casts a lovely spell unlike any other movie this year.
Film Streams Cinema. |
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Z directed by Costa Gavras
MARCH 6-7
Set in an unnamed Mediterranean country that looks a lot like Greece under the repressive regime of “the Colonels,” this electrifying political thriller—winner of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film—begins when a leftwing pacifist leader dies in a hit-and-run accident. A subsequent investigation implicates the government and the police in the case. Yves Montand, Irene Papas, and Jean-Louis Trintignant star in this exciting, ground-breaking conspiracy thriller, which is propelled by Mikis Theodorakis’ pulsating score. |
LOURDES directed by Jessica Hausner (2009)
MARCH 21-22
The Cinematheque partners with the Cleveland International Film Festival on this acclaimed new film showing during the 34th festival (March 18-28 at Tower City Cinemas in downtown Cleveland). |
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| The amazing Sylvie Testud plays a paraplegic woman with MS who makes a pilgrimage to the French Catholic shrine of Lourdes—not because she’s looking for a miracle, but because it’s one of the few excursions available to people in wheelchairs. Director Jessica Hausner channels masters from Bresson and Bruno Dumont to Jacques Tati and Aki Kaurismäki to tell her story. Her precisely-framed, deadpan view of Lourdes is both wry and respectful, full of humor as well as reverence. She never indicates where her story is going, thus holding viewers to the end. Cleveland premiere. |
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33rd ANNUAL CLEVELAND INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
MARCH 18-28
For the past 34 years, the CIFF has been the premier film event in Ohio. It will presents a full survey of contemporary international and American Independent filmmaking, with 150 features and 150 short subjects from over 80 countries including France.
Cleveland International Film Festival. |
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LA DANSE - THE PARIS OPERA BALLET directed by Frederick Wiseman (2009)
MARCH 28 AT 1:30 PM
Veteran documentary filmmaker Frederick Wiseman takes an extensive behind-the-scenes look at the Paris Opera Ballet, capturing not only dancers and choreographers, but also costume makers, marketing strategists, and administrators. “One of the finest dance films ever made.” –The New York Times. Cleveland premiere.
Cleveland Museum of Art.
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CYPRIEN GAILLARD: DISQUIETING LANDSCAPES
JANUARY 30 - APRIL 11, 2010
The modernist tower block, with all its varied associations has been a recurring motif in this young French artist’s seductive and haunting films and photographs. Gaillard (b. 1980), who lives and works in Paris, is keenly aware that these buildings occupy an ambiguous place in the European and North American collective conscious. |
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They recall the utopian ideals associated with modern architecture in the early 20th century and are visual markers of modernization. But they are also connected with sprawling postwar development and, especially in Eastern Europe, can suggest the monolithic authority of Soviet regimes. Many of the vast low-income housing complexes that were built in this form during the postwar years turned into failed social experiments. Some have been purposely dismantled in spectacularly staged demolitions. In Disquieting Landscapes, organized by Senior Curator of Exhibitions Catharina Manchanda, you encounter photographs and film/video works made in the last five years that swerve between documentary observation and extraordinary theatricality. Gaillard often creates associative connections between ancient monuments and contemporary buildings and the aesthetic spaces they define. The artist draws subtle parallels between ancient monuments whose original uses can be shrouded in mystery and contemporary structures whose approaching obsolescence will eventually conceal their own purposes. Where others might simply see eyesores, Gaillard reimagines modernist tower blocks as monuments, ruins, stage sets, and sculptures.
Wexner Center for the Arts. |
CATHARINA MANCHANDA ON CYPRIEN GAILLARD: DISQUIETING LANDSCAPES
MARCH 10 AT 12:30 PM
Senior Curator of Exhibitions Catharina Manchanda helps you navigate the contemporary landscape as featured in Cyprien Gaillard’s photographs and films.
She’ll offer insights that delve into the background of his work and discuss the sites and sights that fascinate him. Manchanda organized the Wexner Center’s current exhibition of Gaillard’s intriguing and provocative work.
Wexner Center for the Arts |
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35 SHOTS OF RUM directed by Claire Denis
THROUGH MARCH 4 |
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One of the best-reviewed films of 2009 returns to Columbus for this special engagement! Claire Denis, known for her subtle, fluid, and intriguing movies, is clearly among the greatest filmmakers of our time. She sets this story in a Paris suburb, where a widowed metro conductor, approaching retirement, lives with his beautiful grown daughter—the object of a neighbor’s romantic interest. The man’s former girlfriend also lives in their building and plays a role in their closely knit lives. 35 Shots of Rum considers the mysterious complexities that surround evolving relationships, whether romantic or parental. This is the rare movie whose plot is driven both by what people say and what they hold back, the meaningful pauses between words, a significant glance, a sexy outfit, a thoughtful gift. It’s a film that holds a mirror up to life as it is actually led. |
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HOME directed by Ursula Meier (2008)
MARCH 18-19
Nominated for best first film at the Césars (the French Oscars), Ursula Meier’s Home offers a new take on the road movie with Isabelle Huppert and Olivier Gourmet in tow. As casually odd as it is unsettlingly funny, Home features Huppert (The Piano Teacher) and Gourmet (of the Dardenne brothers’ films) as a couple living in a ramshackle house at the very edge of a derelict highway. In this French-Swiss director’s version of a road movie, the characters don’t move at all—that is, until a construction crew shows up to shake their house out from under them. |
LE COMBAT DANS L'ILE directed by Alain Cavalier (1962)
Luchino Visconti called Romy Schneider “the best actress of her generation,” and she was never more luminous than in this rediscovered New Wave thriller. Here she grows suspicious of her rich husband (played by Jean-Louis Trintignant, star of such classics as The Conformist, My Night at Maud’s, and Z). First she notices his frequent absences, then she finds a bazooka (!) in his closet. Luckily, her pacifist friend (Henri Serre, Jim in Jules and Jim) is there to comfort her. A protégé of Louis Malle, Cavalier examines France’s political dilemmas of the early sixties with this strikingly photographed, noirish debut.
Wexner Center for the Arts
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HARD TARGETS
THROUGH APRIL 11 |
Wexner Center Galleries This exhibition takes on sports and masculinity as its central themes in a collection of some 70 thought-provoking artworks created over the past 25 years by 21 different artists. French artist Philippe Parreno will be one of the artist featured in the show. In Hard Targets, varied treatments of masculinity get a turn in the spotlight. Hard Targets seeks to revise and complicate our time-honored stereotypes of male athletes and athleticism (as aggressive, heterosexual, hypercompetitive, and remote) by presenting alternative, possibly more democratic, interpretations of subjects frequently revealed to us only in authorized and frankly commercial images. The artists in the show instead investigate sports and masculine identity through topics ranging from biology to business to celebrity, played out in locker rooms, stadiums, and advertising campaigns.
Wexner Center for the Arts - Complete information. |
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CONSUMING CLAY: PORCELAIN WARES FROM THE 18TH AND 19TH CENTRUIES
THROUGH JULY 10 |
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Value, whether monetary or sentimental, actual or perceived, is not static and can be determined by a complex range of variables. Connected to social and class status, porcelain wares from the 18th and 19th centuries were once tangible signifiers of wealth, position and power in Western Europe and the United States. Tables were piled with lavish settings of hand-decorated, fine porcelain—an ostentatious practice that related to ceremony, consumption, ritual and cultural identity. Emphasizing the relationship between consumer practices and luxury goods, Consuming Clay features historical tableware and decorative objects from premier Western European manufacturers such as Sèvres, Meissen, Höchst and Belleek, as well as Chinese export ware.
Art Museum – Miami University - Gallery 3 |
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WHISTLER: INFLUENCES, FRIENDS AND THE NOT-SO-FRIENDLY
FEBRUARY 26-MAY 30
Featuring works on paper from the Toledo Museum of Art’s renowned collection, the exhibition highlights the talents of the iconic American artist James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834–1903), positioning his work within the context of his contemporaries, influences, friends, and enemies. |
As a printmaker, Whistler was a leading personality among all modern etchers. His name is often linked with Rembrandt’s as the most experimental, accomplished, and refined masters of the etched line. In addition to more than 60 prints by Whistler, works by Felix Braquemond, Henri Fantin-Latour, Sir Francis Seymour Haden, Charles Émile Jacque, Alphonse Legros, Charles Meryon, and Joseph Pennell will be exhibited. IMAGE: James Abbott McNeill Whistler (American, 1834–1903) Nocturne. Lithotint, 1878. Museum purchase, 1923.75.
The Toledo Museum of Art - Works on Paper Galleries |
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"SACRED WATERS: INDIA'S GREAT KUMBHA MELA PILGRIMAGE"
THROUGH MARCH 27
OPENING RECEPTION FEBRUARY 18 FROM 4:30-7:30 PM
The exhibit, by French photojournalist Jean-Marc Giboux, features more than 40 dramatic photographs from the Kumbha Mela, a mass Hindu pilgrimage that takes place every three years at one of four sacred locations in India. Millions of Hindu worshippers participate, traveling to Prayag, Hardwar, Ujjain or Nasik to bathe in the sacred waters of the Ganges. It is the largest human gathering in the world, yet few outside of India are familiar with it. Complete information.
H.F. Johnson Gallery - Carthage College
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SPATIAL CITY: THE ARCHITECTURE OF IDEALISM
OPENING: FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2010, 6-9 pm
FEBRUARY 5 - APRIL 18, 2010 |
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Spatial City, the first exhibition in the United States of artwork drawn from France’s network of Regional Contemporary Art Funds (Frac), brings together an international, multi-generational array of contemporary artists whose work contends with utopian thinking and the idealism and cynicism it inspires. Spatial City will travel to Chicago’s Hyde Park Art Center (May 23-August 8, 2010) and Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit - MOCAD (September 10-December 26, 2010). |
If idealism can be seen as having a structure—an architecture, because it is a made thing--we can imagine it as a more or less dialectical engine moving between poles of optimism and cynicism. While the theoretical architecture of Yona Friedman (b. 1923), particularly his “utopia realizable,” was the inspiration for the show’s framework, architecture informs this art exhibition not as a practice but as a way of regarding the world. Artists in the exhibition are responding to the complex problems of postwar society: the failed utopian social experiments that resulted in the dehumanizing conditions of Brutalist architecture, the rise and fall of totalitarian states, the tensions resulting from post-colonial immigration, and the destruction of the environment in the name of progress.
Spatial City : An Architecture of Idealism, is supported in part by Culturesfrance-French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, the French Ministry of Culture and Communication (Délégation aux Arts Plastiques), the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States, and the UWM School of Architecture and Urban Planning.
Institute of Visual Arts (Inova) - University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. |
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MORE EVENTS
Agenda culturel pour la région de Chicago / Cultural Agenda for the Chicago area: LIAISON
Evénements économiques / Economic Events: ECONOMIE/BUSINESS |
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