Art Of The Day Weekly

Books and movies to bury 2014

Christmas time is a moment for assessments. But also a moment with free time we can spend reading and going to the cinema. Our selection clearly shows a strong personalization, as it simply reflects a current tendency for biopics. In the publishing world artists’ monographs are usually catalogues that accompany a retrospective. The works that can transcend that nature are rare objects, such as the Goya by Hofmann. The star system in the movie world reserves biographies for the great masters, as long as their lives present a dramatic side. We all remember the Van Gogh by Minnelli and that by Pialat, the Pollock by Schnabel, the Frida Kahlo by Taymor, in which the beautiful Salma Hayek played the part of her Mexican compatriot, as well as the intimate Rembrandt by Matton and Artemisia by Merlet. The year 2014 was marked by Turner and Hopper, while for 2015 we await the European distribution of the movie by Emma Thompson and Richard Laxton on the scandalous Effie Gray, the wife of John Ruskin and the mistress of Rossetti. Maybe we shall see Picasso, embodied by Antonio Banderas and directed by Carlos Saura, with the name 33 days. The distribution is enticing, presenting the passion the Andaluz artist had for Dora Maar. But it also runs a big risk. Is it possible to restitute a slice of a novelistic life while presenting a world as complex in shapes and colors?