News

Max Beckmann – DEPARTURE

 15/01, 29/01, 12/02, 26/02/2023
»DEPARTURE – MAX BECKMANN AND THE CINEMA«
Theatiner Filmkunst, Munich

© SULLIVAN’S TRAVEL, Park Circus

The painter Max Beckmann was an enthusiastic but also critical cinema-goer. Be it Amsterdam, Saint Louis or New York, he saw a film almost every day in exile, as his diary entries prove. He had a special preference for cinema that provided him with distraction from the strenuous work in the studio, i.e. successful genre films from Hollywood, be it adventure or musical.

In a small film series as part of the large special exhibition ” Max Beckmann – DEPARTURE” in the Pinakothek der Moderne, KINO DER KUNST presents cinema films from the 1940s that Beckmann saw and mentioned in his diaries.

The series opens with THE GREAT SHADOW from 1943, in which Heinrich George, a friend of the Beckmanns in the early 1930s, plays the leading role. Unlike Max Beckmann and his wife, George had not fled into exile, but had remained in Berlin. He died in 1946 in the Sachsenhausen special camp, where he had been interned by the Soviets.

Each Sunday matinée at the Theatiner Filmkunst cinema is preceded by a thematic introduction by the curatorial team of KINO DER KUNST and Pinakothek der Moderne.

******

Termine:

 15.01.2023, 11:00 Uhr

DER GROSSE SCHATTEN

D 1942 – 95 Min. – dt. – 35mm

Regie: Paul Verhoeven
Buch: Harald Bratt
Musik: Hans Otto Borgmann
Kamera: Richard Angst
Cast: Heinrich George, Heidemarie Hatheyer, Will Quadflieg

29.01.2023, 11:00 Uhr

SULLIVAN’S TRAVELS

US 1941 – 90 Min. – engl. OV

Regie & Buch: Preston Sturges
Kamera: John Seitz
Musik: Charles Bradshaw, Leo Shuken
Cast: Joel McCrea, Veronica Lake

12.02.2023, 11:00 Uhr

EASTER PARADE

US 1948 – 103 Min. – engl. O.m.U.

Regie: Charles Walters
Buch: Sidney Sheldon, Francis Goodrich, Albert Hackett
Kamera: Harry Stradling
Musik: Johnny Green, Roger Edens, Irving Berlin
Cast: Fred Astaire, Judy Garland, Peter Lawford

26.02.2023, 11:00 Uhr

 JEZEBEL

 US 1938 – 104 Min. – engl. OV

Regie: William Wyler
Buch: Clements Ripley, Abem Finkel, John Huston
Kamera: Ernest Haller
Musik: Max Steiner
Cast: Bette Davis, Henry Fonda, George Brent, Donald Crisp

Apichatpong Weerasethakul

KINO DER KUNST shows in cooperation with MUBI Germany (in cooperation with Port au Prince Pictures) and Haus der Kunst:

Mon 02/05/2022 | 8.00 pm | City Kinos Munich

MEMORIA

TH 2021 | 136 Min | D: Apichatpong Weerasethakul | OV, Germ. Subs
With Tilda Swinton, Jeanne Balibar, Elkin Diaz
Prix du Jury, Cannes 2021
Guest: Andrea Lissoni (Director of Haus der Kunst, Munich)

Followed by a live talk with Andrea Lissoni (Haus der Kunst) and Simon Field (London)
Tickets

An explosion. Imagination, hearing loss, bomb blast? A metaphysical thriller, slow, deliberate, as befits the protagonist Jessica (Tilda Swinton), who sets out in search of the strange sound, doubtful and yet certain that she did not imagine the detonation. Doubting, because she is in Colombia, land of decades of civil and drug wars, land of millennia-old cultures too, where she visits her sick sister. Sure of her memory, because she is a strong woman who digs deep and deeper to get to the bottom of the mystery. (Heinz Peter Schwerfel)

In collaboration with MUBI Germany (in cooperation with Port au Prince Pictures) and Haus der Kunst 

Shirin Neshat

On the occasion of the Pinakothek der Moderne exhibition “SHIRIN NESHAT. LIVING IN ONE LAND, DREAMING IN ANOTHER”  (Nov. 26, 2021 to April 24, 2022), KINO DER KUNST shows in collaboration with the Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen and the Pinakothek der Moderne and Theatiner Filmkunst:

Wed 06/04/2022 | 8 p.m. | City Theaters
Shirin Neshat is present!
Tickets

LAND OF DREAMS

USA 2021 | 113 Min | D: Shirin Neshat und Shoja Azari | engl. OV
With Sheila Vand, Matt Dillon, William Moseley, Isabella Rossellini
Guests: Shirin Neshat, Shoja Azari

© Shirin Neshat, Land of Dreams

An unusual narrative form for Neshat as a political satire, set in the increasingly closed-off USA in a very near future. It tells the story of a young Iranian-American woman, Simin, one of the last immigrants. Commissioned by a government agency that monitors citizens down to the subconscious, she asks people about their dreams. New York-based, Iranian-born Neshat and her co-director Shoja Azari, both regular artists at KINO DER KUNST, co-wrote their film, which often slides into the surreal, with legendary screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière, who died in 2021 and worked with Louis Malle, Milos Forman, Luis Bunuel and Volker Schlöndorff, among others. The film premiered this year at the Venice Film Festival.

We thank the producer Bon Voyage Films, BR and HFF for their support.

Sun 27/02/2022 | Theatiner | 11.00 a.m.

WOMEN WITHOUT MEN

DE/AT/FR 2009 | 95 Min | D: Shirin Neshat and Shoja Azari | Farsi OV Germ.Subs.
With Shabnan Tolouei, Orsolya Tóth
Introduction: Judith Csiki, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen

© Shirin Neshat, Women Without Men

In her first feature film, which won the Silver Lion at the 2009 Venice Film Festival, Shirin Neshat takes up her most important theme with her own extreme video aesthetic: the difficult role of women in Middle Eastern countries. At the same time, through four interwoven Iranian women’s fates, she evokes the historically last democratic era in her homeland, before the 1953 U.S.-led coup in favor of the Shah.

Sun 30/01/2022 | Theatiner | 11.00 a.m.

LOOKING FOR OUM KULTHUM

DE/AT/IT/MA 2017 | 90 Min | D: Shirin Neshat and Shoja Azari |Engl./Germ./French OV Germ. Subs. | With Neda Rahmanian, Yasmine Rais
Introduction: Nina Orda, KINO DER KUNST
Shirin Neshat about LOOKING FOR OUM KULTHUM

Traumsequenz: Mitra (Neda Rahmanian) steht mit Oum Kulthum (Najia Skalli) am Geländer und schaut auf das Meer ©RazorFilm
© RazorFilm

This is the making-of a film about the Egyptian singer Oum Kalsoum (1904-1975), still the most important musician in the Arabic-speaking world. Torn between the difficult filming in Morocco and family problems with her adolescent son, director Mitra visibly confuses reality and imagination. In her second feature film, Shirin Neshat uses seductive images, beguiling music and camera work taken from her video works to create a double portrait of women: director Mitra and the young teacher Ghada, who portrays Oum Kalsoum.

NEW OCEAN SEA CYCLE: PINAKOTHEK ED. 1/14 – BAFFIN

Thursday, Oct 21st, 2021, 6.30 pm
Ernst von Siemens-Auditorium at the Pinakothek der Moderne

Participation in the event is only possible after prior registration. Tickets can be booked via München Ticket, admission is free.

With his company Ballet of Difference, based at Schauspiel Köln and deeply rooted in Munich, the U.S. choreographer Richard Siegal works on hybrid forms in which not only different art disciplines but also aesthetic and scientific perspectives interpenetrate. In his work NEW OCEAN, for example, Siegal integrates a sculptural approach of dancing bodies together with ecological questions about global warming into a mathematical choreographic system. For the Pinakothek der Moderne, Richard Siegal is working on a choreographic form that actively engages the bodies of the dancers in a dialogue with the architecture and the sculpture HOWL by artist Anish Kapoor.

The recipient of some of the most coveted art awards and high civilian honors, Anish Kapoor is one of the world’s most influential contemporary sculptors; Richard Siegal’s Ballet of Difference sets the standard for diversity, relevance, and enthusiastic audience acceptance.

A film by Nightfrog, Director: Benedict Mirow

Choreography and stage: Richard Siegal
Costumes: Flora Miranda
Light: Matthias Singer
Music: Alva Noto and Ryuichi Sakamoto with the Ensemble Modern
Rehearsals: Zuzana Zahradnikova
Dramaturgy: Tobias Staab
Dancers: Martina Chavez, Margarida Isabel De Abreu Neto, Livia Gil, Mason Manning, Andrea Mocciardini, Claudia Ortiz Arraiza, Evan Supple, Zuzana Zahradnikova, Long Zou

A production by Schauspiel Köln and Tanz Köln
A co-production with the Muffatwerk München

Supported by the Ministery for Arts and Science of Nordrhein-Westfalen in collaboration with the NRWKULTURsekretariat, by the Cultural Department of the City of Munich Kulturreferat der Landeshauptstadt München and the Kunststiftung NRW

Interlude 2021/22

DUTCH PAINTING, SHIRIN NESHAT AND MORE

After the successful fourth edition of KINO DER KUNST in October last year, the interlude before KINO DER KUNST 2022 will follow in fall 2021. The special program combining the visual arts and cinema was created in close cooperation with the Alte Pinakothek, the Haus der Kunst and the Pinakothek der Moderne. KINO DER KUNST thus finds a permanent place in Munich’s art and cinema landscape again this fall.

JACOBUS VREL (17/10–28/11/2021)

Accompanying the collection presentation Jacobus Vrel in the Alte Pinakothek (12.10.2021 to 27.02.2022), KINO DER KUNST in cooperation with the Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen shows film art in the cinema Theatiner, each with an expert introduction!

© Peter Webber, Girl With a Pearl Earring

KINO DER KUNST Awards 2020

The award ceremony of KINO DER KUNST 2020 was dignifiedly held in cyberspace. The artistic director Heinz Peter Schwerfel manifested himself as an avatar, while recordings of an intensive festival week provided insights into the concentrated work of the jury.

Here you’ll see the online award ceremony.

MAIN AWARD KINO DER KUNST

FEATURE-LENGTH FILM CATEGORY
“Tlamess” by Ala Eddine Slim

SHORT FILM CATEGORY
“Don’t Look At The Finger” by Hetain Patel

AWARD FOR A CROSS-DISCIPLINARY ŒUVRE

Anicka Yi

KINO DER KUNST PROJECT AWARD 2020

Josse Thuresson & Karin Keisu for “My tongue is a 10 cm long Swedish flag”

Symposium: THE ART OF THE MOVING IMAGE IN DIGITAL TIMES

FR 30/10/2020
kinoderkunst.de/online-events

10.00 – 11.30 a.m.
VISIBILITY—IS STREAMING A SOLUTION FOR THE ART OF THE MOVING IMAGE (AMI)?
Podium: Matt Carter (London), Ulanda Blair (Hong Kong), Emilija Škarnulytė (Vilnius), Filipa Ramos (London)
Moderation: Heinz Peter Schwerfel (Artistic Director KINO DER KUNST)

11.30 a.m. – 1.00 p.m.
THE FUTURE ART MARKET FOR AMI—A NEW ENERGY?
Podium: Ingrid Lohaus (Munich), Ron Mandos (Amsterdam), Daniel Hug (Cologne), Emilio Álvarez (Barcelona)
Moderation: Olaf Stüber (Co-founder Videoart at Midnight, Berlin)

2.00 – 3.30 p.m.
CO-PRODUCTIONS—WITH TV, STREAMING ENTERTAINMENT SERVICES, MUSEUMS, GALLERIES, FESTIVALS OR CINEMA SUBSIDIES?
Podium: Julian Rosefeldt (Berlin/Munich), Teresa Hoefert de Turégano (Berlin), Beatrice Bulgari (Rome), Jacqui Davies (London)
Moderation: Daniel Lang (Filmmaker, Spokesman for the University of Television and Film Munich)

3.30 – 5.00 p.m.
WHAT WILL BE NEW FOR COLLECTORS AND MUSEUMS?
Podium: Markus Hannebauer (Berlin), Caroline Bourgeois (Paris), Chris Dercon (Paris), Hans Ulrich Obrist (London)
Moderation: Andrea Lissoni (Artistic Director, Haus der Kunst)

Read more

Artist Talk: Luca Guadagnino | 31/10

Ernst von Siemens Auditorium der Pinakothek der Moderne
Saturday 31/10, 7:00 p.m.

Artist Talk with Jury President Luca Guadagnino. The talk will be conducted by Andrea Lissoni, Artistic Director, Haus der Kunst.
Unfortunately, the Artist Talk with Halil Altındere, previously scheduled for this day, has been canceled.
Free admission for ticket holders.
Go to the Ticket Store

Anna McCarthy und Paulina Nolte: BLOODLESS (2019-2020)

Ernst von Siemens Auditorium der Pinakothek der Moderne
Wednesday 28/10, 7:00 p.m.
In cooperation with Museum Brandhorst
The artists will be present.

© Anna McCarthy, BLOODLESS POOL, 2020, Digitales Video, Farbe, Ton, ca. 10 Min.

BLOODLESS BOUTIQUE, 2019
Digital video, color, sound, approx. 5 min.
Two slightly snobby ladies and a handbag in a bizarre-surreal shop scene. The first part of Anna McCarthy and Paulina Nolte’s BLOODLESS series revolves around the sensitive soul of a luxury leather handbag and sets the tone for the sequels.

BLOODLESS POOL, 2020
Digital video, color, sound, approx. 10 min.
In summer 2020, the second episode of the series was created and features the protagonists leading the audience into aquamarine blue abysses.

BLOODLESS BRANDHORST, 2020
Digital video, color, sound, approx. 15 min.
In the third part of their film series, Anna McCarthy and Paulina Nolte transform themselves into vampires and Museum Brandhorst into a scene of mysterious events. BLOODLESS BRANDHORST was commissioned by Museum Brandhorst and will be premiered on the occasion of KINO DER KUNST: “Welcome to reality, Madame.”

Sold out: Lies & Beauty I

The screening on Tue 27/10 8.00 pm is already sold out! Get your tickets for the second screening on
Wed 28/10 6.00 pm | City Kinos

The program Lies & Beauty presents films by Wang Tuo,  The Interrogation (CHN 2017, 35MM, 18’35’’) and Neïl Beloufa,  Occidental (FRA 2017, 73’).

The Interrogation © Wang Tuo

The Interrogation of Chinese Artist Wang Tuo discovers psychological tricks in a job interview. The answers are particularly interesting when revealed by an officer from the “Commission for Disciplinary Inspection,” along with the methods he uses during interrogations.

Occidental © Bad Manner’s

In Neïl Beloufas Occidental there are riots and demonstrations across French cities—as well as in front of the Parisian Hotel Occidental where Giorgio, an Italian, has booked the bridal suite for himself and his boyfriend Antonio. The hotel lobby, with its ’70s décor, forms the backdrop for this tabloid comedy inspired by the contemporary social climate in which satirical anecdotes about homophobia, racism, misogyny and a fear of terrorism abound. Nothing is serious, everything is fake. Isn’t it?

Cancelled: Artist Talk with Halil Altındere

We are sorry to announce that due to the Covid-19 travel restrictions for people coming from Istanbul, Halil Altındere will not be able to attend the festival KINO DER KUNST. The Artist Talk scheduled for Saturday, 31/10, is therefore cancelled.

But of course you can still come and see his film in the International Competition screened in the program Politics & Beauty.
Fr 30/10 18.00 | Theatiner Filmkunst
Sa 31/10 14.30 | Kinos der HFF
Halil Altındere, Ballerinas and Police (TUR 2017, HD, 9’39’’)

together with
Kudzanai Chiurai, We Live in Silence (Ch. 1–7)  (ZWE 2017, 41’41’’)
Isaac Julien, Lessons of the Hour (GBR 2019, 35mm, 4k, 25’45’’)
Mauricio Sanhueza, The Magic Bullet (PER 2018, HD VIDEO, 3’06’’)
Larissa Sansour & Søren Lind, In Vitro (PSE, DNK, GBR 2019, 4K, 28’)

The new trailer of KINO DER KUNST

WITH
AMIE JAMMEH, ANA SARAIVA, ISABELLA WOLF, LUIS LÜPS,
SOPHIA LINDNER, THOMAS HAUSER, YURIKA YAMAMOTO

Director & Concept SUSANNE STEINMASSL
Director of Photography FELIX PFLIEGER
Set Design LOUIS PANIZZA
Costume CLAUDIA IRRO & JULIA RIEDERER
Music ANGELA AUX & BENI BARTELLOW
Hair & MakeUp SABRINA REUSCHL
1st AC FRANZISKA HURM
Gaffer PHILIPP SLABOCH
Color Grading ZE MARIA ABREU SANTOS
Editing SUSANNE STEINMASSL & AARON ARENS
Sound Mixing ANDREW MOTTL
Set Runner LUKAS RÖDER
Set Photography STEPHIE BAUER
Rental KLT GmbH
Producer SUSANNE STEINMASSL
Production Assistant ISABELLA WOLF
Produced by INSELGRUPPE

MANY THANKS TO
Infratec GmbH for supplying us with the Thermal Camera, Loreen Graffunder, Roman Krauß, Alina Grasmann for the art print of her painting “The Montauk Project (you are a fortune man)”, Carl Friedrich Rein, HFF München, Jette Beyer, Elena Diesbach, Daniel Lang, Beate Bialas, Sabina Kannewischer, Ina Mikkat, Florian Kreier, Liv Steinmassl, Jessica Dettinger, Form of Interest, Mona Sardari, Elisa Maria Nadal, Cintia Rangel, Besamungsstation Greifenberg, Cucurucu, Florian Biehler, Isabel Kienemann, Heinz Peter Schwerfel

SHOT ON Infratec Thermal Camera

© INSELGRUPPE / SUSANNE STEINMASSL, 2020
www.susannesteinmassl.de

The new catalogue has arrived!

… at least virtually. In the last days and nights all the team of KINO DER KUNST did a really great job and worked togehter to present the best catalogue since the founding of KINO DER KUNST. Here you can read it online or download it (PDF).

You’ll find detailed information about

* the International Competition: all artists, all films
* the International Jury
* the Project Pitch and its jury
* the Symposium held to the topic of “The art of the moving image in digital times”
* the Artist Talks

and, of course, practical information such as venues, ticket fees etc.

KINO DER KUNST 2020 will open its doors at the end of October

We keep our word: KINO DER KUNST is coming back! And to the cinema, as the name promises. The edition 2020 will be held from October 27 to November 1 in Munich’s theaters and museums. Initially the 4th edition has been planned for the end of April. In spite of this difficult time, in spite of Covid-19 and the circumstances that go with it, we are looking forward with joy and a certain relief to a new intensive edition that will let us experience art on the big screen again.

KINO DER KUNST 2020 postponed

Following the Bavarian State’s decision to issue a state of emergency due to the spread of COVID-19, the management and team of KINO DER KUNST have decided to postpone the festival for artists’ films originally planned for the end of April 2020. The festival’s International Competition on the topic of Forbidden Beauty is expected to take place as planned in autumn 2020.

The previously announced Prologue (originally scheduled for March 25 – April 15 at Theatiner Filmkunst) has been cancelled due to State cinema closures. Combi-tickets that have already been purchased may be returned for a full refund at the box office of the Theatiner as soon as the cinema opens again for business. Additional information on this may be found at: theatiner-film.de, kinoderkunst.de and facebook.com/KinoderKunst.

We will keep you informed as we know more about further developments on news and via Facebook.

PROLOGUE 20 | Yuri Ancarani | CANCELLED DUE TO COVID-19

The Challenge

© Yuri Ancarani

25/03/20 — 8:30 p.m. | CANCELLED DUE TO COVID-19
Theatiner Filmkunst

FRA, ITA 2016 | 70 min | Arabic with English subtitles | D: Yuri Ancarani
TALK: Heinz Peter Schwerfel (Artistic director, KINO DER KUNST), Daniel Sponsel (Artistic director, DOK.fest)
In cooperation with the DOK.fest München

The falcon travels in a private jet, the cheetah in a Lamborghini as sheiks from Qatar head off into the desert with their exotic pets. A falconry contest is on the agenda. The young men in their dazzling white thawb robes represent a world of absurd wealth, luxurious hobbies and splendid idleness. Secretly, however, they are driven by a yearning for the adventuresome life of their Bedouin ancestors. In the endless sand dunes, far away from civilization, they stage a trial of strength and endurance that keeps the thousand-year-old tradition of falconry alive.

In sublime cinemascope images, the Italian artist Yuri Ancarani (*1972, exhibitions at the Guggenheim Museum, NY, among others) has created a modern aristocratic portrait of the super rich that conjures up a neo-romantic image of the Orient – simultaneously strange and fascinating.

PROLOGUE 20 | Masbedo | Cancelled due to Covid-19

Welcome Palermo

© Masbedo & Inbetweenartfilm

01/04/20 — 8:30 p.m. | Cancelled due to Covid-19
Theatiner Filmkunst

IT 2019 | 75 min. | Italian with English subtitles | Directed by: MASBEDO | GUEST: MASBEDO (Nicolò Massazza & Iacopo Bedogni) | TALK: Heinz Peter Schwerfel (Artistic Director, KINO DER KUNST)

An intermedia art project for Manifesta 12 in Palermo, in which the Italian artist duo MASBEDO – Nicolò Massazza (* 1973) and Iacopo Bedogni (*1970) – recall one of the iconic cities of Italian cinema. For it is here that Luchino Visconti filmed Il Gattopardo, Francesco Rosi the mafia film Salvatore Giuliana and Michelangelo Antonioni parts of L’Avventura.
For their interactive video installation, MASBEDO converted a minivan into a “video-mobile” – a combination of mobile stage, production studio and open-air cinema – that made stops at the city squares in Palermo. The artists spoke with the residents, the mayor and the Sicilian princess Vicky Alliata about the meaning of cinema and initiated readings and performances. The resulting documentary film Welcome Palermo depicts the video-mobile as an installation-like space of memory that artistically stages the film history of the city.

PROLOGUE 20 | Marina Abramović | Cancelled due to Covid-19

Waiting for the Artist

Cate Blanchett as Izabella – Documentary Now! _ Season 3, Episode 4 – Photo Credit: Rhys Thomas/IFC

08/04/20 — 8:30 p.m. | Cancelled due to Covid-19
Theatiner Filmkunst

USA 2016 | 26 min. | English | Directed by: Alex Buono & Rhys Thomas | With Cate Blan­chett, Fred Armisen | Afterwards: Surprise film by Marina Abramović | GUEST: Marina Abramović | TALK: Heinz Peter Schwerfel (Artistic Director, KINO DER KUNST)
In cooperation with the Bayerische Staatsoper

None other than Cate Blanchett plays the great Marina Abramović in this satiric “mockumentary” of the U.S. series Documentary Now! As the fictional performance artist Izabella Barta (Cate Blanchett) prepares for a large retrospective of her work, she must make amends with her former lover Dimo alias Ulay (Fred Armisen), a notorious artworld provocateur. The blueprint for the satire is Matthew Aker’s Emmy Award-winning documentary film The Artist is Present (2012). Many of the Serbian artist’s performances, including her sensational MoMA show in 2012, are parodied with relish by Blanchett. Abramović, whose operatic project 7 Deaths of Maria Callas premiers on April 11, 2020 at the Munich State Opera, demonstrates humor by attending the film screening at the Theatiner in person: the artist is present.

PROLOGUE 20 | Thierry Mugler | Cancelled due to Covid-19

Acción Mutante

© Alex de la Iglesia/TF1

15/04/20 — 8:30 p.m. | Cancelled due to Covid-19
Theatiner Filmkunst

ES 1993 | 91 min. | Spanish with English subtitles | Directed by: Álex de la Iglesia | With Antonio Resines, Alex Angulo, Frédérique Feder | Costume design: Thierry Mugler | INTRODUCTION: Dunja Bialas (Film Critic)
In cooperation with the Kunsthalle München
The French fashion designer Thierry Mugler (*1948) is one of the most visionary craftsmen of his trade. He combines glamour with eroticism and science fiction, breaks codes and defies conventions in creations that are sensual universes full of dramatic feelings. For Álex de la Iglesias’ cult film Acción Mutante, Mugler has created costumes with protruding shoulder pads and metallic bras as well as futuristic uniforms. This sci-fi grotesque by comic fan De la Iglesia revolves around the terrorist unit Acción Mutante that has shattered the world of the beautiful and rich. The film was produced by Pedro Almodóvar. De la Iglesia (*1965) is associated with the work of David Lynch and Quentin Tarantino and is considered the enfant terrible of Spanish film. A cinema evening in conjunction with the exhibition Thierry Mugler: Couturissime on view from April 3 – August 30, 2020 in the Kunsthalle München.

Charlotte Rampling is announced Jury President

The British actress Charlotte Rampling will chair the jury of the fourth edition of the international artists’ film festival KINO DER KUNST taking place in Munich from April 22 – 26, 2020. The movie icon, who was awarded the Berlinale’s Honorary Bears last year, has worked with directors from Italian cinema such as Luchino Visconti and Liliana Cavani and authors of the new French cinema including Patrice Chéreau, Claude Lelouche and François Ozon as well as with Sidney Lumet, Alan Parker, Nagisa Oshima, Axel Corti and Lars von Trier.
Charlotte Rampling is the third film actress, following Amira Casar and Nina Hoss, to serve on the jury for KINO DER KUNST.
The other members of the international jury are Hong-Kong-based director of photography Christopher Doyle, highly acclaimed for his collaboration with director Wong Kar-wai and the Irish-born international artist Teresa Hubbard.

Kino der Kunst 2020 Teaser

Ballerinas and Police
Opening Video by Halil Altındere

Halil Altindere, Ballerinas and Police, 2017 HD Video, Farbe, Ton, Courtesy of the artist and Pilot Gallery, Istanbul 5

“Ballerinas and Police” (2017): The author of the opening video teaser of KINO DER KUNST 2020 is the well-established Turkish artist Halil Altındere whose works has been shown in the International Competition of KINO DER KUNST. He systematically broaches the important issue of contemporary social reality such as police violence, migration, the life of Turkish community in Germany. Altındere lives and works in Istanbul.
The teaser gives an idea of the next KINO DER KUNST edition’s theme: forbidden beauty.

Interlude 18/19

Utrecht, Caravaggio & Europa
Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau & Reynold Reynolds

© Reynold Reynolds 'Die Verlorenen' (2012)
© Reynold Reynolds ‘Die Verlorenen’ (2012)

09/06/19 — 11 a.m.
Theatiner Filmkunst

Murnau’s lasting black and white orgy from the shadow world ‘Nosferatu’, complemented by the homage to the silent film ‘The Lost’ by Reynold Reynolds, who lives in Amsterdam.
Introduction: Patrick Kammann, Bavarian State Painting Collections, Munich

Reynold Reynolds | THE LOST | DE 2012, 16 min
Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau | NOSFERATU | DE 1922, 94 min (German OV)
With Max Schreck

Interlude 18/19

Utrecht, Caravaggio & Europa
David Lynch & Julian Rosefeldt

© Julian Rosefeldt, Deep Gold (2014)
© Julian Rosefeldt, Deep Gold (2014)

26/05/19 — 11 a.m.
Theatiner Filmkunst

David Lynch’s rich orgy of eroticism and violence ‘Blue Velvet’ meets Julian Rosefeldt’s ‘Deep Gold’, a cinematic nightmare between avant-garde and apocalypse of the late Weimar Republic.
Introduction: Bernd Ebert, Bavarian State Painting Collections, Munich

Julian Rosefeldt | DEEP GOLD | DE 2014, 18 min
David Lynch | BLUE VELVET | US 1986, 121 min (Engl OV German Subs)
With Isabella Rossellini and Dennis Hopper

Interlude 18/19

Utrecht, Caravaggio & Europa
Paolo Sorrentino & Luca Trevisani

© Luca Trevisani, Sudan, 2016
© Luca Trevisani, Sudan, 1999

19/05/19 — 11 a.m.
Theatiner Filmkunst

Much beauty, but also aesthetic innovation and plenty of nostalgia: Paolo Sorrentino succeeded with his Oscar winner, a homage to Fellini’s ‘Dolce Vita’ and ‘Roma’ evoking the ‘eternal city’, a mixture of cynicism and tenderness, with spectacular camera movements and magical moments. Luca Trevisani’s tribute to the last white rhinoceros in North Africa, Sudan, guarded by heavily armed rangers, which the artist surrounds with lengths of cloth as if to protect him from impending death, is also tender, but by no means cynical.
Introduction: Susanne Hoppe, Bavarian State Painting Collections, Munich, with Heinz Peter Schwerfel, Kino der Kunst

Luca Trevisani | SUDAN | I 2016, 15 min
Paolo Sorrentino | LA GRANDE BELLEZZA | I, F 2013, 241 min (Italian OV, German subs)

Interlude 18/19

Utrecht, Caravaggio & Europa
Hitchcock & Melhus

© Bjørn Melhus: The Bathroom (2011)
© Bjørn Melhus: The Bathroom (2011)

02/06/19 — 11 a.m.
Theatiner Filmkunst

Hitchcock’s classic ‘Psycho’, taken up again and again by contemporary artists, is introduced by Bjørn Melhus’ exuberant ‘Bathroom’, in which the artist leads Hitchcock’s original voice – with a cute accent – through a contemporary villa.
Introduction: Lars Zieke, Bavarian State Painting Collections, Munich

Bjørn Melhus | THE BATHROOM | DE 2011, 5 min
Alfred Hitchcock | PSYCHO | US 1960, 109 min (Engl OV German Subs)
With Anthony Perkins and Janet Leigh

Interlude 18/19

ARTIST TALK
ANNE IMHOF

Eliza Douglas in Anne Imhof, Faust, 2017 Deutscher Pavillon, 57. Internationale Kunstausstellung– La Biennale di Venezia © Fotografie: Nadine Fraczkowski Courtesy: Deutscher Pavillon 2017, die Künstlerin
Eliza Douglas in Anne Imhof, Faust, 2017 Deutscher Pavillon, 57. Internationale Kunstausstellung– La Biennale di Venezia © Fotografie: Nadine Fraczkowski Courtesy: Deutscher Pavillon 2017, die Künstlerin

09/04/2019 — 7 p.m.
Pinakothek der Moderne | Auditorium

Anne Imhof (born 1978) is one of the most important and original artists of our time. Her work spans the genres of performance, painting and room installation; she examines the traditional images and processes handed down through culture and the mass media and develops new tactics to reach a broader definition of the term “performance”. With the success of very few artists, she precisely captures the existentialism of current life and conveys it in impressive scenes and images that long remain with the viewer. The moving image serves not only for archival purposes but also to complement the live performances.
Anne Imhof has already held numerous international exhibitions. In addition to other important prizes, including the Berliner Preis der Nationalgalerie, she won the prestigious Golden Lion at the 2017 Venice Biennale for her work “Faust”, which was shown at the German Pavilion. Recently, the PIN Young Circle (PIN.YC) sponsorship group of the Pinakothek der Moderne purchased five of Anne Imhof’s drawings for the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung. She created these insightful sketches as studies for the five-hour-long performance in the German Pavilion.
Anne Imhof in conversation with Michael Hering (Director of Staatliche Graphische Sammlung München) and Katja Blomberg (Director of Haus am Waldsee Berlin)
Free admission

INTERLUDE 18/19

ARTIST TALK
Bjørn Melhus
CAN YOU SEE MY ART?

SUGAR (Digital Film / production still – work in progress, voraussichtlich 2019)©Bjørn Melhus
SUGAR (Digital Film / production still – work in progress, voraussichtlich 2019)©Bjørn Melhus


21/03/2019 – 6.30 p.m.

Pinakothek der Moderne | Auditorium

The German Norvegian artist, born in 1966 and living in Berlin, is the only most successfull and well-known filming artists in Germany who consistently combines social criticism with ironically grotesque stagings.
By exploiting the history of pop culture, mass media and cinema in his short films, he celebrates a unique balance between pessimistic melancholia and hysterical humour. With a very personal signature – Melhus plays all parts himself. Winner of many awards at festivals such as Oberhausen or institutional honors as the German Filmpreis, he has been incarnating many heroes of the Western mass culture, from James Dean or Jim Morrison to Marylin Monroe, Janis Joplin or the philosopher of capitalism Ayn Rand.
For the “Interlude” he presents his most recent works and gives an insight into his film SUGAR, which is still in production. In his talk he will also deal with the relationship of film and installation.
Website Bjørn Melhus
Moderated by Bernhart Schwenk (Curator of Contemporary Art at the Pinakothek der Moderne)
Free admission

Interlude 18/19

La Ferdinanda: Sonata for a Medici-Villa
Rebecca Horn

© Rebecca Horn, La Ferdinanda, 1982 Courtesy by Rebecca Horn
© Rebecca Horn, La Ferdinanda, 1982 Courtesy by Rebecca Horn

27/02/2019 | 9 p.m. | Introduction Franziska Stöhr
Filmmuseum München | Tickets 089 / 23 39 64 50

La Ferdinanda: Sonata for a Medici Villa is staged in a grand Renaissance hunting seat. The setting serves as a haven for tranquil repose (for Caterina de Dominicis, former opera singer and owner of the villa), convalescence (for young ballet dancer Simona), hiding (for Dr. Marchetti, after a series of scandals), rehearsal (for the cello player) and celebration (for a wedding party). The villa is a symbol for hidden stories and faded glories, especially for its larger-than-life owner, who wishes to maintain an illusion of luxury and grandeur. In truth, the villa’s residents are all living in a state of suspension or impotence: even the peacocks’ plumage is not strikingly colourful but a ghostly white. (Source: Tate Modern)

Rebecca Horn (born 24 March 1944, Michelstadt, Hesse) is a German visual artist, who is best known for her installation art, film directing, and her body modifications such as Einhorn (Unicorn), a body-suit with a very large horn projecting vertically from the headpiece. She directed the films Der Eintänzer (1978), La ferdinanda: Sonate für eine Medici-Villa (1982) and Buster’s Bedroom (1990). Horn presently lives and works in Paris and Berlin.

La Ferdinanda: Sonata for a Medici-Villa | Federal Republic of Germany 1982 | D+Sc: Rebecca Horn | DOP: Jiri Kadanka | M: Ingfried Hoffmann | C: Valentina Cortese, Javier Escriba, Gisela Hahn, Hans-Peter Hallwachs, Michael Maisky, David Warrilow | 85 min

Interlude 18/19

Impressions de la Haute Mongolie (Impressions of Upper Mongolia)
Salvador Dalí

© Salvador Dalí, IMPRESSIONS DE LA HAUTE MONGOLIE, 1976 Courtesy by José Montes-Baquer
© Salvador Dalí, IMPRESSIONS DE LA HAUTE MONGOLIE, 1976 Courtesy by José Montes-Baquer

20/02/2019 | 9  pm | Attending Bodo Kessler | Introduction M+M
Preceded by UN CHIEN ANDALOU (An Andalusian Dog)
Filmmuseum München | Tickets 089 / 23 39 64 50

A rare pearl of a very special kind presents the series “‘Cinema Dreams in Artists Cinema”: “Impressions of Upper Mongolia” has been conceived in 1976 by the surrealist and eccentric Salvador Dalí for the TV station WDR. It is about an imaginary trip in search of a hallified mushroom, told with a range of surrealistic video effects.
A special highlight of the evening organized by KINO DER KUNST: The Munich artist duo M+M, responsible for the introduction of the program, succeeded in locating the cameraman of the film realized jointly by Salvador Dalí and WDR director José Montes-Baquer. Bodo Kessler, who also worked with Rebecca Horn, Nam June Paik and Volker Schlöndorff, tells the story of the genesis of the project, from the first meeting with Dalí and Frau Gala in New York to the shooting in her house in Cadaques, Spain.

Impressions de la Haute Mongolie | BRD 1976 | D: José Montes-Baquer | B: Salvador Dalí | DOP: Bodo Kessler, Manfred Kage | M: Ingfried Hoffmann | 57 min | French OV with German subtitles
“Salvador Dalí and his fellow surrealists owed a great debt to the wealthy, dandyish French writer Raymond Roussel, as much as modernist poets owed the Symbolist Jules Laforgue. But like Laforgue, Roussel is much more often referenced than read, and he isn’t referenced often. A hermetic, insular writer who seems to belong to a private world almost entirely his own, Roussel despaired of his lack of success and committed suicide in 1933. His aesthetic progeny, on the other hand— Dalí, Marcel Duchamp, André Breton—were showmen, self-promoters and media geniuses. So it’s particularly poignant, in the quirkiest of ways, that Dalí chose for his final film project a collaboration with Jose Montes Baquer in 1976 called “Impressions of Upper Mongolia” (“Impressions de la haute Mongolie”—above with English subtitles), an homage to Roussel’s self-published 1910 novel Impressions of Africa.
Roussel, who traveled widely, never traveled to Africa, and his “impressions” are wholly creations of the kind of wordplay that Dalí made visual in his painting (including a canvas with Roussel’s title). Like Roussel’s novel, Impressions of Upper Mongolia is a surrealist fantasy with only the most tenuous connection to its ostensible geographical subject.” (openculture.com)

Preceded by:
Un Chien andalou | France 1929 | D: Luis Buñuel | B: Luis Buñuel, SalvadorDalí | DOP: Albert Duverger | C: Simone Mareuil, Pierre Batcheff, Luis Buñuel, Salvador Dalí | 16 min | OV with Engl. Subtitles
“Un Chien Andalou made quite the stir upon its release. It was presented first at an invitation only-session at the Studio des Ursulines art house on June 6, 1929. It had its public release at Montmartre’s Studio 28 on October 1st. While not officially part of the Surrealist movement until after the film had shown, Dali and Bunuel’s film was quickly adopted by the group as part of their aesthetic repertoire.” (wherethelongtailends.com)

Zwischenspiel 18/19

Controfigura (The Stand-in)
Rä di Martino

© Rä di Martino, La Controfigura, 2017 Courtesy by Rä di Martino
© Rä di Martino, La Controfigura, 2017 Courtesy by Rä di Martino

13/02/2019 — 9 p.m. | Attending Rä di Martino
Filmmuseum München | Tickets 089 / 23 39 64 50

A small film crew is wandering about Marrakesh and the surrounding desert. They are looking for locations for the remake of the American film “The Swimmer” in which a man swims his way home, passing through the houses and pools that he finds along the route. (Biennale di Venezia)

Statement of the artist: “Traveling in Morocco and talking to the many Europeans who transferred there, I was struck by the number of hotels, swimming pools and immense golf courses that have been constructed in recent years, especially in Marrakesh. The city has to face an ever growing number of tourists of all kinds, and has to keep them all happy: from the wealthy Russians, Arabs or Europeans, who build themselves private paradises walled off from the rest of the city, to ex-hippies and people on package tours. New presences that have profoundly transformed the landscape, with hundreds of swimming pools scattered around the city. This is where I imagined my swimmer, a stand in suffering from a midlife crisis, and at the same time the crisis of his alter egos, of the real actors and of the system they represent.” (Rä di Martino)

Zwischenspiel 18/19

Visages Villages (Faces and Places)
Agnès Varda

Agnès Varda, Visages Villages, 2017 Courtesy by Weltkino
© Agnès Varda, Visages Villages, 2017 | Courtesy by Weltkino

06/02/2019 | 9 p.m. | Introduction: Herlinde Koelbl
Filmmuseum München | Tickets: 089 / 23 39 64 50

Working for the first time with a co-director, French artist JR, the 90 years old veteran documentary  maker Agnès Varda makes study of ‘faces and places’.
“Visages, Villages is a movie about itself: the subjects are so warm and wonderful it’s a wise move. Varda and JR travel to small French towns in his van, which is decorated like an enormous camera. Inside is a photo-booth and large format prints spit out the side. Is there actually an assistant dropping the images out? Yes, probably, but while this movie is about the process of making art, it doesn’t want to destroy the magic entirely.” (The Guardian)

Agnès Varda will be honoured with the Berlinale Camera 2019.

Agnès Varda is one of the most important contemporary francophone filmmakers. She started out as a theatre photographer in Paris before shooting her first feature film in 1954, with no prior filmmaking experience. Through Alain Resnais, who edited the film, Varda first came into contact with the circle surrounding the Cahiers du Cinéma, who would later go on to form the core of the French Nouvelle Vague. Visages, villages (Faces Places), made in collaboration with French artist JR, was nominated for the 2018 Oscar for Best Documentary Feature.

JR (Juste Ridicule) is the pseudonym of a French photographer and artist whose identity is unconfirmed. Describing himself as a photograffeur, he flyposts large black-and-white photographic images in public locations, in a manner similar to the appropriation of the built environment by the graffiti artist. He states that the street is “the largest art gallery in the world”.

Herlinde Koelbl is since the end of the 1980’s Germany’s most widely discussed photographer and documentary maker. She is knewn for her portraits of well-known German personalities from politics and business world. Mostly she offers large-scale thematic projects, often dealing with societal taboos. Since the end of the 1980`s one of Germany’s most widely discussed photographers.

Interlude 18/19

Short film program
Matthias Müller & Christoph Girardet

© Christoph Girardet, Matthias Müller, PERSONNE, 2016
Courtesy by Christoph Girardet, Matthias Müller

30/01/2019 — 9 p.m.
Filmmuseum München

Since 1999 the experimental filmmaker Matthias Müller and the media artist Christoph Girardet realise together award-winning short films, which have been produced in a rigorous formal processes  to create fascinating images and film poems. Mostly from their own 35mm takes and carefully selected found footage film excerpts, they exaggerate cinema into art, treat topics like childhood (“Meteor”), mirror scenes (“Crystal”) or light effects (“Contre-Jour”). All her films are a new dramatic condensation of the raw material cinema, such as the calm editing sequence of seemingly undramatic scenes in “personne”, a tribute to the great, behind his roles completely disappearing French “Nobody” Jean-Louis Trintignant.

THE NEXT EDITION OF KINO DER KUNST WILL TAKE PLACE IN 2020

The Artistic Director of KINO DER KUNST has decided to postpone the next edition of KINO DER KUNST until spring 2020. This unique blend of festival and exhibition with films by visual artists is the only one of its kind in the world. Taking place in Munich every two years, it will be held next year as planned with the sensitive issue of “Forbidden Beauty”.
The rescheduling results from the move forward of this year’s Venice Biennale, which is now scheduled for early May 2019. This change prevents many artists from presenting their works at KINO DER KUNST.
At the same time, the postponement of international projects will allow KINO DER KUNST to significantly enhance the content of ZWISCHENSPIEL, the in-house festival held between the main editions. This year, the London-based artist duo Gilbert & George was responsible for its highly successful première. ZWISCHENSPIEL 2019’s high-calibre programme will run into April and present the film series “Dream Time” in the Filmmuseum München as well as Artist Talks with Bjørn Melhus and Anne Imhof in the Pinakothek der Moderne.

Interlude 18/19

Banksy
Exit Through the Gift Shop

© Bansky, Exit Through the Gift Shop, 2010 Courtesy by Alamode
© Banksy, Exit Through the Gift Shop, 2010
Courtesy by Alamode

23/01/2019 — 9 p.m.
Filmmuseum München

In this feature film where what is real and what might be fake blurs, the infamous, shadowy British graffiti street artist Banksy, who has literally left his mark on cities throughout the world, comes in contact with Thierry Guetta, a Los Angeles-based Frenchman who videotapes various underground art escapades. EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP follows Guetta’s attempts to capture the ever-elusive Banksy at work–only to have the mischievous artist turn the camera back on him with hilarious results. Is it all real? Or could this be Banksy’s greatest stunt yet? The film contains footage of Banksy, Shephard Fairey, Invader and many of the world’s most infamous graffiti artists at work.
Introduction: Sebastian Pohl (Positive-Propaganda e.V.)
Get your tickets now!
Ticket phone (Germany): 089 / 23 39 64 50.

Interlude 18/19

Alejandro Jodorowsky
Poesía sin fin (Endless Poetry)

Endless Poetry_1__©Pascale Montandon-Jodorowsky
Endless Poetry_1__©Pascale Montandon-Jodorowsky

16/01/2019 — 9 p.m.
Filmmuseum München

Endless Poetry is an ode to the quest for beauty and inner truth, as a universal force capable of changing one’s life forever, written by a man who has dedicated his existence to creating spiritual and artistic awareness, told through Jodorowsky’s unique surreal and psychedelic visual language.
Introduction: Dunja Bialas (film critic)

Interlude 18/19

Thank you, Gilbert and George!

© Kino der Kunst
Gilbert und George beim KINO DER KUNST Zwischenspiel 18/19 im Filmmuseum München © Kino der Kunst

The film series “Cinema Dreams in Artists Cinema” has started! On January 10, 2019, Gilbert and George kicked off the series at the Filmmuseum in Munich and showed how much they have become one with their art figures. Seeing Gilbert and George’s perfect performance during the audience discussion all questions of authenticity, illusion and disillusion as well as the difference between reality and fiction were obsolete. Art is being, being is art.

Interlude 18/19

Film series
Cinema Dreams in Artists Cinema

Special Opening
GILBERT & GEORGE

© Philip Haas, The Singing Sculpture 1991 Foto: Gilbert & George, Courtesy by Philip Haas
© Philip Haas, The Singing Sculpture 1991
Foto: Gilbert & George, Courtesy by Philip Haas

09/01/2019 — 9 p.m. (Preview)
10/01/2019 — 7 p.m. (With Gilbert & George!)
Filmmuseum Munich

We are looking forward to welcoming the British artist duo Gilbert & George for the Special Opening of the new film series CINEMA DREAMS IN ARTISTS CINEMA on January 10, 2019. You can book tickets now!
Our ticket phone number is 089 / 23 39 64 50.
See projects

Interlude 18/19

ARTIST TALK
PHIL COLLINS

Phil Collins, Delete Beach, 2016 HD animation loop; colour, sound; 21 min. Rubber crumble, tyres, refuse, liquid pools, lights. Installation view, Phil Collins: Can’t Do Right For Doing Wrong, HOME, Manchester, 2018. Photo: Lee Baxter. Courtesy Shady Lane Productions, Berlin.
Phil Collins, Delete Beach, 2016
HD animation loop; colour, sound; 21 min. Rubber crumble, tyres, refuse, liquid pools, lights.
Installation view, Phil Collins: Can’t Do Right For Doing Wrong, HOME, Manchester, 2018.
Photo: Lee Baxter. Courtesy Shady Lane Productions, Berlin.

04/12/2018 — 8 p.m.
Harry Klein

British artist Phil Collins (born 1970) studies the nuances of social relationships in different locations and global communities in his films, installations, photographs and live events. With new forms of artist actions such as a disco marathon in Ramallah, satirical teleshopping events, karaoke performances “Made in Japan” or call-to-vinyl actions, Phil Collins is expanding his video art to cross genres and include performance, theatre and music production. His work completely redefines the term “multimedia”.
The professor of video art at the Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln (Academy of Media Arts Cologne) was nominated for the Turner Prize, is a winner of the Paul Hamlyn Award for Visual Arts and received the Audience Award at KINO DER KUNST in 2015.
For the “Zwischenspiel / Interlude”, Phil Collins at the “Harry Klein” club explores a space where – as in his art – dance, music and visuals coalesce into a unified emotional experience.
The talk is moderated by Heinz Peter Schwerfel (Artistic Director of KINO DER KUNST)
Free admission

INTERLUDE 18/19

ARTIST TALK
MARK LEWIS

©Mark Lewis_Museum (2018) Film Still
©Mark Lewis_Museum (2018) Film Still

24/10/18, 7 p.m.
Kunstverein Munich

Born 1958 in Ontario, Canada, the photographer and filmmaker lives today in London and mostly works in a crossover of abstract analysis, the tradition of experimental film and the emotional perception of landscape or architecture.
Much of his work focuses on style and technology of film, for instance on the complex narration of long tracking shots. His films are nearly always short, precise exercises on particular techniques of filmmaking and spatial perception, they particularly tend to look at contemporary cities, film history, and the way film has impacted ideas about everyday life. Mark Lewis had many solo shows in important museums around the world and represented in 2009 Canada at the Venice Biennale.
Website Mark Lewis
Talk in English. Moderated by Heinz Peter Schwerfel (Artistic Director of KINO DER KUNST)
Free admission

ON TOUR 18

Istanbul
DIRIMART DOLAPDERE

AES+F, Inverso Mundus, Still #1-05, 2015 © AES+F I ARS New York. Courtesy of the artists, MAMM and Triumph Gallery
AES+F, Inverso Mundus, Still #1-05, 2015 © AES+F I ARS New York. Courtesy of the artists, MAMM and Triumph Gallery

20/07 – 29/07/18

Dirimart: KINO DER KUNST

In Cinemas 18

SHIRIN NESHAT
“LOOKING FOR OUM KULTHUM“

Traumsequenz: Mitra (Neda Rahmanian) steht mit Oum Kulthum (Najia Skalli) am Geländer und schaut auf das Meer ©RazorFilm
Dream sequence: Mitra (Neda Rahmanian) and Oum Kulthum (Najia Skalli) standing at the handrail and watching the ocean © RazorFilm

10/06/18, 11.00
City Kino
Discussion with Shirin Neshat after the screening

The Egyptian singer Oum Kulthum (1900 to 1975) is still celebrated worldwide as the “Callas of the Orient”, as a timelessly outstanding artist with an extraordinary voice and unforgettable musical intensity. Often forgotten is that Oum Kulthum lived during a politically dramatic era in Egypt – she was and remains a legendary woman for the male-dominated Islamic world.

Read more

It was only a question of time until her life and music would become a topic for the Iran-born Shirin Neshat, one of the most important contemporary artists, who was last year’s winner of the world’s most significant art prize, the Praemium Imperiale. In her photos, video installations and films, Neshat – whose works are regularly presented at KINO DER KUNST in Munich – often addresses the solitude of the Muslim woman in a world dominated by men. But instead of simply filming another biopic à la Hollywood and dutifully retelling the life of the famous Egyptian, Neshat introduces autobiographical details and the stylistic concepts of her own art. Oum Kulthum’s life and work become a cinematic artwork that – apart from all chaotic historical and present events – celebrates the strength of a woman and artist in the Islamic world.

Filmed in today’s Morocco, the script by Shirin Neshat and her partner and long-term accomplice Shoja Azari narrates a story within a story, i.e. the attempts by an alter ego of the artist – constantly shaken by doubt and drama – to film Oum Kulthum’s life. Stylistically, however, the film particularly emphasizes the singing and stage presence of the musician, just as it accounts for the videos of the New York-based artist. These include silent dream sequences, sophisticated choreography in the presence of the protagonists, an absence of all psychological simplification, and the beauty of the images and tracking shots typical for Neshat.

An event from NFP marketing & distribution in cooperation with KINO DER KUNST.