Untitled - EMAF

INTERNATIONALE AUSWAHL // INTERNATIONAL SELECTION
They are both icons: the pop elf Björk and the art star Matthew Barney. They have been a couple for years, and for so many years,
Björk has refused to work together with Barney. With his latest film ›Drawing Restraint 9‹, he was at last able to persuade her.
The highly unusual story is set on the Nisshin Maru, a Japanese whaling boat. While the whales are mistreated on the deck, Björk and
Barney lie below deck in a close embrace, kissing passionately, engrossed in a Japanese tea ritual. The boat comes alive, with the storerooms
gradually taking on the appearance of the inside of a whale. The lovers take no notice of it. They filet each other with large, shining
knives until they are transformed into whales, swimming towards the Antarctic.
With ›Drawing Restraint 9‹ Matthew Barney leaves all common narrative patterns behind him. He has created a powerfully visual,
conceptual work of art that is rich with symbols from Far Eastern cultures, with references to constant reincarnation. Those who let
themselves in for this film will be rewarded with images and impressions that cannot be seen anywhere else in film. And it goes without
saying that the soundtrack is an exquisite treat.
Matthew Barney * 1967 in San Francisco. In 1991, he graduated from Yale University. Since then, he has created work that fuses
sculptural installations with performance and video. His singular vision foregrounds the physical rigors of sport and its erotic undercurrents
to explore the limits of the body and sexuality. He is best known as the creator of the CREMASTER films, a series of five visually
extravagant works created out of sequence. The films are a grand mixture of history, autobiography, and mythology, an intensely private
universe in which symbols and images are densely layered and interconnected. The resulting cosmology is both beautiful and complex.
Matthew Barney won the prestigious Europa 2000 prize at the 45th Venice Biennale in 1993. He was also the first recipient of the
Guggenheim Museum's Hugo Boss Award. Matthew Barney lives and works in New York City. Public collection: MOMA, New York /
Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, New York / Whitney Museum of American Art, New York / Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas / MCA Chicago
/ Walker Art Center, Minneapolis / Tate Gallery, London / Astrup Fearnley Museet, Oslo.
Björk, born in Raykjavik, Iceland, 1965. Lives in New York. She learned to play the piano for nine years from the age of 5. In 1977,
her CD ›Björk‹ transformed her into the world's best-known Icelandic musician, at the tender age of 11. She formed her band ›Sugarcubes‹
in 1986. Their debut album ›Life is Too Good‹ acquired world-wide popularity in 1988. After it disbanded, she started a solo career, releasing
›debut‹ in 1993. She appeared in the film ›Dancer In The Dark‹, and won the Best Actress award at the 2000 Cannes film festival. This
has made her known as an actress throughout the world. In 1996, Björk visited Japan for the first time, living at Budokan. As a ›Diva in
Iceland‹, she has been gaining a lot of fans by performing at Fuji Rock Festival and the Athens 2004 Olympic Games. In 2005, she
appeared in Matthew Barney's film ›Drawing Restraint 9‹, and took charge of this film's soundtrack.
// USA/J, 2005, 35mm, OmU, 135:00
// Regie: Matthew Barney
// Musik: Björk
// Cast: Matthew Barney & Björk
// Distribution: Alamode Filmverleih; www.alamodefilm.de
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