Czech Republic

An exciting few days in the Czech Republic releasing CONCERTO – A BEETHOVEN JOURNEY.   Who doesn’t love Prague? What a wonderful city – especially if you visit a little after the tourist season.  It is only of those wonderful European cities of music – like Vienna and Paris – that hours can be spent just wandering around, popping into churches and concert halls, drinking coffee and eating the occasional cream-filled cake.   The first screening was for the music folk of Prague – not least the Prague Spring Festival and also the Rudolphinum concert hall.  The project had started here in 2012 so it was nice to bring the finished film to them to view.  My local distributors had done a good job of subtitling and posters, etc, not to forget the drinks and snacks afterwards.  The whole evening went very well – and everyone seemed to really enjoy and appreciate the film.  The next day we repeated the process with the local film and music press – and that too went well.  Leif Ove is one of those pianists that if you know him you love, and if you see him in the film for the first time you also love him immediately. The problem, as ever, is how to draw people into the cinema to see someone they have not heard of – which is why we stress the Beethoven angle.  But it’s tricky.  I have two subsequent public screenings to the east then north of the country and while everyone who came loved the film the attendances were poor. (50 people in a 200 seater cinema).  That’s why Hollywood spends millions on marketing…  Not an option for us.  However, what was really encouraging was how popular EXHIBITION ON SCREEN is with audiences and how they are really looking forward to next year’s films….

Premiering The Curious World of Hieronymus Bosch

So, what’s it like watching your film have its world premiere?   Autumn has certainly arrived – and sometimes for me it’s the close, dark misty days of a European city that really bring that home. The Netherlands is a wonderful country but I have certainly seen the sun there all too rarely I have to admit. It’s more often a collar-up, hat on, kind of place. This Thursday was no different. As I and my colleague and friend David Bickerstaff landed in Amsterdam, I swear we could have reached up and touched the grey clouds.  I was reminded of the week we spent filming in Den Bosch six months earlier when, again, the sun came out only once – remarkably when we were filming a wide shot of the city from across some fields.  It hadn’t mattered much as the success of the Hieronymus Bosch exhibition at the Noordbrabants Museum had meant they were staying open to 1am every morning (!).  That meant we had to film the exhibition from 1.30am to 8.30am over subsequent nights.  It was the most glorious exhibition and rightfully deserved to be a huge success – 421,000 visitors which for a provincial gallery is astounding.  People drove from all over Europe. Some even flew from overseas – even Australia. Once again this proves our love of art. 

It is, in fact, almost exactly a year since we first heard about the exhibition and made an instant decision to make a film about it and Bosch. Now, November 3^rd 2016, here David and I were in Bosch’s hometown to host the world premiere of our 13^th and latest EXHIBITION ON SCREEN film.  I think what made this a particularly enjoyable film to make was that, really without exception, the museum was staffed by the loveliest, most helpful folk.  From the museum’s director to the security guards who looked after us through the nights of filming, they could not have been more co-operative and welcoming. So it was a delight to be with them all in the local ‘Old Biscuit Factory’ cinema.  After an introductory drink and welcome to all, we took our seats and waited for that magical movie moment – when the lights go down.  Who doesn’t have that sense of anticipation and excitement as, seated where one can’t be reached by the outside world, darkness falls and you know you’re going to be taken to another world.  I love cinema – and always have.  It’s part of the motivation for making these art films first and foremost for the cinema – it’s still far and away the best place to see any film.  And so, 100 or more or us sat together in the darkness and witnessed the opening credits…EXHIBITION ON SCREEN & SEVENTH ART PRODUCTIONS present…   And off we went.  My, how stunning the film looked!  I hadn’t seen it finished on the big screen and the quality was astounding.  It costs us a small fortune to send small hard drives to every cinema (almost 1500 worldwide now) but – with cinemas having upgraded their digital capabilities enormously in recent years – you, we, the audience can now watch at a quality level previously undreamt of.   After the film, even those who had lived with those Bosch paintings through the exhibition said they had seen details they had not noticed before.  There was a warm ovation for the film at the end followed by a bit of a bar crawl in Bosch’s home town…maybe drinking in the same bars he himself once drank in. On the other hand, judging by his pictures, maybe he’d have gone straight home to say his prayers. 

Filming THE ARTIST’S GARDEN – AMERICAN IMPRESSIONISM

Hello everyone. Apologies for these too-long gaps between blogs but it has been fantastically busy recently being in production of 4 films and in pre-production of 4 others.  We also distribute our own films and that means dealing with 50+ countries now, all of whom we love dearly but all of whom do have different needs and requirements. I’ve always said days should be 36 hours long! (Yes, I know that makes no sense…). Anyway, I am just back from an exhausting but wonderful shooting trip to the United States and I hope you’ll like to hear a little bit more about it. We are making a film about the American Impressionist period that essentially stretches from 1880-1920 and, in particular, its linkage to the development of the garden at the same time. It’s a film with challenges of course – I doubt if too many of our audience in Chile or Italy, Korea or South Africa know the names of Hassam, Wier, Robinson, Chase, etc, but I find that exciting; we’re bringing to you some superb and significant artists who played a key role in creating and developing an American school of art. Through them we will also get a real insight into two other conjoining narratives: the changing nature of American society at that time and the developing emancipation of women who were progressing from being merely the object of the male artist’s gaze to becoming significant artists in their own right.

Me and my super crew’s journey began in Boston, took in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia. It is such a huge country and this is but a 500 stretch of coastline but as one interviewee put it ‘this is the country’s megopolis’. It is so rich in both urban and rural splendour. Many of the American impressionists lived in cities but sought the restorative powers of the country garden & landscape whenever they could, especially in the summer. Jumping on the new railroads made this easy and it’s no accident that so-called artist colonies sprung up all over – most notably at Cos Cob, Cornish, Old Lyme and on Appledore Island. Here groups of artists – largely men but certainly not exclusively so – came to paint in convivial surroundings. As you can imagine, gardens were an excellent resource offering up many manner of colour combinations – and ever-changing depictions of light.  In our film we will explore the growth of the garden in America – and clearly this dates back to the early settlers (but for sustenance and medicaments) – up to the turn of the 19^th to 20^th centuries when the garden became a place of respite and reflection. Some of these plants and flowers had arrived recently to the USA and artists could easily spend as much time painting a flower or flowers as they would a human portrait. There was a trade the other way too – I was fascinated to hear from one of my interviewees the story of the native American flower we call the sunflower.

That was an export to Europe…and think of Van Gogh and others who fell in love with that particular exotic import.  Monet’s example is just as strong – the story of the water lily is fascinating and too long for a blog but look it up. 

I am forever enthralled by how artists study their garden subjects – and, more than that, study the light that falls on flowers and plants. The light variations are endless and the great artists all share that passion to look, learn, capture. There were a good handful too of American artists who made a bee-line for Giverny (and Monet). Monet was no teacher but one or two made it through his personal defences – becoming a friend, quasi-student, even in one case a relative. His art was more open to all-comers.This radical new style of ‘impressionism’ was much taken upon by the visiting artists and it wasn’t long before they were taking it home with them. This, allied with the arrival in American collections, of the first impressionist works from France created this new artistic movement on the eastern shores of the United States.

As ever, everyone we met in these locations and galleries was so enthusiastic and generous that it made the shoot a real pleasure. It’s always a slog – up early, to bed late, and so on but if the film can capture the joy and expertise of this fascinating story then we’ll have done our job. We’re already editing and, frankly, a little awash with footage and stories but we’ll find a nice clear path through our own complex garden and hope you’ll enjoy our colourful offering as much as these artists enjoyed them.

Filming THE ARTIST’S GARDEN – AMERICAN IMPRESSIONISM

Hello everyone. Apologies for these too-long gaps between blogs but it has been fantastically busy recently being in production of 4 films and in pre-production of 4 others.  We also distribute our own films and that means dealing with 50+ countries now, all of whom we love dearly but all of whom do have different needs and requirements. I’ve always said days should be 36 hours long! (Yes, I know that makes no sense…). Anyway, I am just back from an exhausting but wonderful shooting trip to the United States and I hope you’ll like to hear a little bit more about it. We are making a film about the American Impressionist period that essentially stretches from 1880-1920 and, in particular, its linkage to the development of the garden at the same time. It’s a film with challenges of course – I doubt if too many of our audience in Chile or Italy, Korea or South Africa know the names of Hassam, Wier, Robinson, Chase, etc, but I find that exciting; we’re bringing to you some superb and significant artists who played a key role in creating and developing an American school of art. Through them we will also get a real insight into two other conjoining narratives: the changing nature of American society at that time and the developing emancipation of women who were progressing from being merely the object of the male artist’s gaze to becoming significant artists in their own right.

Me and my super crew’s journey began in Boston, took in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia. It is such a huge country and this is but a 500 stretch of coastline but as one interviewee put it ‘this is the country’s megopolis’. It is so rich in both urban and rural splendour. Many of the American impressionists lived in cities but sought the restorative powers of the country garden & landscape whenever they could, especially in the summer. Jumping on the new railroads made this easy and it’s no accident that so-called artist colonies sprung up all over – most notably at Cos Cob, Cornish, Old Lyme and on Appledore Island. Here groups of artists – largely men but certainly not exclusively so – came to paint in convivial surroundings. As you can imagine, gardens were an excellent resource offering up many manner of colour combinations – and ever-changing depictions of light.  In our film we will explore the growth of the garden in America – and clearly this dates back to the early settlers (but for sustenance and medicaments) – up to the turn of the 19^th to 20^th centuries when the garden became a place of respite and reflection. Some of these plants and flowers had arrived recently to the USA and artists could easily spend as much time painting a flower or flowers as they would a human portrait. There was a trade the other way too – I was fascinated to hear from one of my interviewees the story of the native American flower we call the sunflower.

That was an export to Europe…and think of Van Gogh and others who fell in love with that particular exotic import.  Monet’s example is just as strong – the story of the water lily is fascinating and too long for a blog but look it up. 

I am forever enthralled by how artists study their garden subjects – and, more than that, study the light that falls on flowers and plants. The light variations are endless and the great artists all share that passion to look, learn, capture. There were a good handful too of American artists who made a bee-line for Giverny (and Monet). Monet was no teacher but one or two made it through his personal defences – becoming a friend, quasi-student, even in one case a relative. His art was more open to all-comers.This radical new style of ‘impressionism’ was much taken upon by the visiting artists and it wasn’t long before they were taking it home with them. This, allied with the arrival in American collections, of the first impressionist works from France created this new artistic movement on the eastern shores of the United States.

As ever, everyone we met in these locations and galleries was so enthusiastic and generous that it made the shoot a real pleasure. It’s always a slog – up early, to bed late, and so on but if the film can capture the joy and expertise of this fascinating story then we’ll have done our job. We’re already editing and, frankly, a little awash with footage and stories but we’ll find a nice clear path through our own complex garden and hope you’ll enjoy our colourful offering as much as these artists enjoyed them.

EXHIBITION ON SCREEN in Russia

May 20-23 2016.

A thrilling few days in Russia - one of the absolute homes of art. 

EXHIBITION ON SCREEN is becoming increasingly popular across the country and I was delighted to be invited for a special Museum Weekend of screenings in St Petersburg and Moscow.

I attended 6 museum screenings and every one was packed. It was also great to see such a mixed demographic - lots of youngsters, young couples as well as our more traditional older audience.

Just as exciting of course was to wander the streets of St Petersburg - home of the extraordinary Hermitage Art Gallery (that we are to be working with soon) - and Moscow the next day. 

I had been to Moscow in the 1990s while making a film about Marshall Zhukov - and it's barely recognisable today. Modern, thriving, wealthy - at least on the surface in the centre of the city. I went to visit the Pushkin and Tretyakov museums too - stunning collections.  I can't wait to come back.