“The film listens for this community’s heartbeat, finding its steady pulse just as expected: healthy and strong.” – New York Times “Stirring, bittersweet, and reflective.” – Boston Globe 100% on Rotten Tomatoes
“The Silence Before Bach is a movie in which to take refuge, and it abjures the summer heat of pop culture for a cool and lasting immersion in the miracles that people are and can create.” – The Boston Globe “The engaging enigma of The Silence Before Bach demonstrates an artistic wisdom that is as satisfying as it is challenging.” – Seattle Times “Provide[s] gorgeous lensing and art direction and some of the world’s most beautiful music.” – New York Post “Like the music it celebrates, this is a film made in glory of the world.” – New York Times
Synopsis:
Blending historical reconstruction with very loosely linked ‘dramatic’ scenes and documentary sequences, the film constitutes a playful, painterly sequence of variations on the argument that Johann Sebastian changed the way the world hears thanks to his extraordinary ear for harmony.Come early and enjoy the Bach Cello Suites live in our lobby performed by Celeste Cumming, starting at 4:30pm.
Sponsored by Suzanne Hopgood in honor of Frank Lord.
This film showing is part of the Mandell JCC’s 28th Annual Phyllis Hoffman Hartford Jewish Film Festival!
“The story is unique and ultimately illuminates not just an odd time in the history of 42nd Street (“the Deuce”) but an unusual tale of the American Jewish experience.” – Orlando Weekly “The true genius of Queen of the Deuce is how one woman’s life story opens up into a multitude of perspectives, allowing all the voices in her family to share in this portrait of the immigrant experience.” – That Shelf
Synopsis:
From the late ’60s to the mid ’80s, in the notorious Times Square area known as the Deuce, the eccentric, Greek-born Chelly Wilson built a porn cinema empire and a reputation as one of the most savvy and charismatic figures on the scene. With a cigarette in hand and bags of money stashed in the corner, Chelly regularly held court in her bunkerlike apartment above the legendary 8th Avenue all-male Adonis Theatre, summoning a lively cabal of associates, entertainers and fellow poker players, with her female lovers always hovering and grandchildren often underfoot. Yet few in her circle knew of the risks she took to get there. Queen of the Deuce reveals Chelly’s origins as a taboo-breaking entrepreneur and traces the fraught events that lead to her departure from Europe on the eve of war, and the unconventional trajectories of her American business ventures and personal life. With the rise of feminism, the sexual revolution and gay pride in frame, Queen of the Deuce is an alternate take on cultural history as seen through Chelly Wilson’s empowering story of survival.This film showing is part of the Mandell JCC’s 28th Annual Phyllis Hoffman Hartford Jewish Film Festival!
“A handsome, stirring, yet untaxing dose of underdog-sports uplift.” – Washington Post “A film that often feels like one has walked into an oil painting: well-crafted, lovely to look at, and rather old-fashioned.” – Associated Press “When people say ‘they don’t make movies like that anymore,’ this is the kind of movie they’re talking about.” – RogerEbert.com
Synopsis:
The Boys in the Boat is a sports drama based on the #1 New York Times bestselling non-fiction novel written by Daniel James Brown. The film, directed by George Clooney, is about the 1936 University of Washington rowing team that competed for gold at the Summer Olympics in Berlin. This inspirational true story follows a group of underdogs at the height of the Great Depression as they are thrust into the spotlight and take on elite rivals from around the world.In honor of Martin Luther King Jr., you are invited to experience a day of film programming and community building. Free admission!
Come for one film or stay all day!Programming
11 AM | Mighty Times: The Children’s March (40 min.)
The mostly unheard story of the youth of Birmingham, Alabama, who braved fire hoses police dogs and jail in 1963 to bring segregation to its knees. This film is a part of our Film Field Trip Program. All children are welcome. (Sensitive images are used in the film). Hall will lead those present in a discussion about Mighty Times: The Children’s March after the film.12:30 PM | The First Rainbow Coalition (55 min. Suitable for teens and adults.)
This film charts the history and legacy of a groundbreaking multi-ethnic coalition, “The Rainbow Coalition” that rocked Chicago in the 1960s. It sparks new dialogue about the 1960s, providing an unparalleled platform for contemporary discussions on race and class in an increasingly divided United States.1:30-2:30 PM | Guided Discussion led by Film Facilitator Derek Hall
Hall will lead those present in a discussion about The First Rainbow Coalition2:30PM | Rustin (106 min. PG-13)
This 2023 biographical film tells the story of the charismatic, gay civil rights activist Bayard Rustin. Despite incredible odds, he managed to organize the March on Washington in 1963, one of the high points of the civil rights movement in the United States.Art-Making Activities Throughout the Event!
There will be a table with art activities open throughout the event! Great for all ages – drop in at any time!Lunch
Bagged lunch will be available for purchase or bring your own lunch! $5 donation recommended.About Derek Hall:
Derek Hall is a dynamic anti-racist intergroup dialogue facilitator, public speaker, and activist committed to challenging beliefs and institutional culture rooted in systemic racism and other forms of oppression. Derek has worked in the diversity, equity, and inclusion field for over fifteen years, partnering with public and private school systems, for profit and non-profit organizations both locally and nationally. His passion for decolonized education, human connection, and implementation of racial equity strategies has inspired sustainable change at the internal, interpersonal and institutional levels within the organizations he works with. Derek uses his gifts of facilitation, storytelling and community building to increase the racial & social consciousness of individuals and organizations.
Thousands of students view these films in Real Art Ways’ Film Field Trip Program. “…a rousing success that got me thinking about my own experiences.” – The Boston Globe “One of the best and boldest American comedies in years with a dynamite performance by an Oscar-ready Jeffrey Wright.” – ABC News “The best picture of the year.” – Washington Post 92% on Rotten Tomatoes
Synopsis:
American Fiction confronts our culture’s obsession with reducing people to outrageous stereotypes. Jeffrey Wright stars as Monk, a frustrated novelist who’s fed up with the establishment profiting from “Black” entertainment that relies on tired and offensive tropes. To prove his point, Monk uses a pen name to write an outlandish “Black” book of his own, a book that propels him to the heart of hypocrisy and the madness he claims to disdain.Nominated for 5 Academy Awards!
Best Picture Best Actor – Jeffrey Wright Best Supporting Actor – Sterling K. Brown Best Adapted Screenplay Best Original Screenplay“Often beautiful, never pretty, occasionally creepy and perpetually surprising, Poor Things lives in Stone’s fiery eyes; her performance is, to borrow Bella’s words, a changeable feast.” – Seattle Times “The best movie of the year.” – RogerEbert.com “You won’t know what hit you, which is just one reason why I’m rabid to see it again.” – ABC News “Both literary and cinematic, Poor Things gives the audience everything we can ask for in a film — beauty and wonder; hefty ideas and clever storytelling; twists, shocks and laughter.” – Wall Street Journal “mordantly funny, whimsical and wacky, unprecious and unpretentious, filled with so much to adore that to try and parse it all here feels like a pitiful response to the film’s ambitions.” – indieWire 93% on Rotten Tomatoes
Synopsis:
From filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos and producer Emma Stone comes the incredible tale and fantastical evolution of Bella Baxter (Stone), a young woman brought back to life by the brilliant and unorthodox scientist Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe). Under Baxter’s protection, Bella is eager to learn. Hungry for the worldliness she is lacking, Bella runs off with Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo), a slick and debauched lawyer, on a whirlwind adventure across the continents. Free from the prejudices of her times, Bella grows steadfast in her purpose to stand for equality and liberation.“A fond character study that luxuriates in its subject’s livewire personality while acknowledging how exasperating and exhausting he could be.” – BBC.com “Engrave an Oscar for Bradley Cooper for his heart-full-to-bursting tour de force as Leonard Bernstein. Alive with glorious music, the film resonates with the love the bisexual legend feels for the wife (a sublime Carey Mulligan) who lives with his demons.” – ABC News “…Maestro is the real deal: the rousing, complex and heartbreaking rhapsody its subject deserves.” – Financial Times “An absolute marvel. One of the finest films of the year.” – Rolling Stone “Bradley Cooper exerts and exhausts his soul.” – IndieWireGolden Globe nominee for Actor in a Drama Motion Picture, Actress in a Drama Motion Picture, and Drama Motion Picture.
Synopsis:
Maestro is a towering and fearless love story chronicling the lifelong relationship between Leonard Bernstein and Felicia Montealegre Cohn Bernstein. Starring Bradley Cooper and Carey Mulligan, this film is a love letter to life and art. At its core, it’s an emotionally epic portrayal of family and love.Above image:
Mariana Iacono and Juan De La Mar, El VIH se enamoró de mi (HIV Fell in Love With Me), 2024. Commissioned by Visual AIDS for Red Reminds Me…Day With(out) Art 2023: Red Reminds Me…
Real Art Ways is proud to partner with Visual AIDS for Day With(out) Art 2024 by presenting Red Reminds Me…, a program of seven videos reflecting the emotional spectrum of living with HIV today. Red Reminds Me… will feature newly commissioned videos by Gian Cruz (Philippines), Milko Delgado (Panama), Imani Harrington (USA), David Oscar Harvey (USA), Mariana Iacono and Juan De La Mar (Argentina/Colombia), Nixie (Belgium), Vasilios Papapitsios (USA). Through the red ribbon and other visuals, HIV and AIDS has been long associated with the color red and its connotations—blood, pain, tragedy, and anger. Red Reminds Me… invites viewers to consider a complex range of images and feelings surrounding HIV, from eroticism and intimacy, mothering and kinship, luck and chance, memory and haunting. The commissioned artists deploy parody, melodrama, theater, irony, and horror to build a new vocabulary for representing HIV today. The title is drawn from the words of Stacy Jennings, an activist, poet, and long-term survivor with HIV, who writes: “Red reminds me, red reminds me, red reminds me…to be free.”* Linking “red” to freedom, Jennings flips the usual connotations of the color and offers a new way of thinking about the complexity of living with HIV. Just as a prism bends and refracts light, Red Reminds Me…, expands the emotional spectrum of living with HIV. It shows us that while grief, tragedy, and anger define parts of the epidemic, the full picture contains deeper, nuanced, and sometimes contradictory feelings. This video will be continuously screening (on loop) from December 2, – December, 4 from 1pm-7pm in our Video Gallery. Visual AIDS is a New York-based non-profit that utilizes art to fight AIDS by provoking dialogue, supporting HIV+ artists, and preserving a legacy, because AIDS is not over. *Jennings recites this poem in the video Here We Are: Voices of Black Women Who Live with HIV, created by Davina “Dee” Conner and Karin Hayes for Day With(out) Art 2022: Being and Belonging.Video Synopses
Gian Cruz, Dear Kwong Chi In Dear Kwong Chi, Cruz creates a video letter to the late artist Tseng Kwong Chi, drawing from the experience of living with HIV in diaspora. Across continents and decades, Kwong Chi’s legacy acts as an anchor for Cruz amongst limited representations of Asian narratives in AIDS histories. Milko Delgado, El Club del SIDA Taking its title from a sensational telenovela episode, El Club del SIDA cycles through a lifetime of heavily stigmatizing images about HIV and AIDS. Delgado plays with multiple aesthetics—documentary, horror, comedy—to explore the various relationships he has had with AIDS over the course of his life. Imani Harrington, Realms Remix Through a collage of poetry and archival images, Realms Remix traces memories and sensations of an AIDS past that continue to haunt the present. David Oscar Harvey, Ambivalence: On HIV & Luck Ambivalence: On HIV & Luck tackles the disorienting experience of existing with a manageable condition that our present culture insists on representing in terms of its bleak past. Interested in figuring HIV differently, the film presents a series of visual puns merging the iconography of HIV and AIDS with popular symbols of luck. Mariana Iacono and Juan De La Mar, El VIH se enamoró de mi (HIV Fell in Love With Me) HIV Fell in Love With Me tells the story of a woman with HIV embracing her sexuality and reconnecting with her pleasure. Filmed with an erotic aesthetic, the video reflects a pursuit towards sexual justice and autonomy for women living with HIV. Nixie, it’s giving Through home videos, archival footage and textile landscapes, it’s giving explores various forms of family across time. The artist’s domestic life is paired with archival video of queer and trans chosen families mirroring small acts of joy, resistance, and sustenance. What does it mean for an HIV+ person, who carries the history and present of the AIDS-crisis in their DNA, to foster new life? Vasilios Papapitsios, LUCID NIGHTMARE Papapitsios describes LUCID NIGHTMARE as a “meditation on how we can(not) heal in the environments that make us sick, from the perspective of an infected neurodivergent faggot.” Combining auto-fiction with magical realism, Papapitsios humorously reimagines narratives around mental health and chronic illness.
Artist Biographies
Gian Cruz (he/him) is a Filipino artist, researcher, and arts worker. His artistic practice is rooted in photography, art theory, and criticism and intersects with cinema, performance, and HIV/AIDS activism within Southeast Asian frameworks. He has worked with the National Museum of Modern & Contemporary Art, Korea; Jeu de Paume, Paris; Picto Foundation, Paris; Palais Galliera, Paris; Musée de la Mode de la Ville de Paris; La Biennale di Venezia; the Japan Foundation; Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin; Bienal de Curitiba; Blackwood Gallery, Toronto; Pride Photo Award, Amsterdam; and 4A Centre for Contemporary Art, Sydney. Juan De La Mar (they/them) is a lawyer, HIV+ activist, and artist from Colombia. Their documentary debut, De Gris a POSITHIVO, has won 16 awards and screened at 52 festivals worldwide. They have performed at the Bogotá Museum of Modern Art (MAMBO) and were selected as the 2024 HIV Culture Residency at the Centro de Arte Contemporáneo de Quito. As an activist, they have worked with the Latin American HIV-Positive Youth Network (J+LAC) and they currently coordinate Bogota’s Fast-Track Cities strategy to accelerate the response to HIV/AIDS. Milko Delgado (he/him) is a transdisciplinary artist whose cultural practice integrates various forms of research and knowledge production, primarily within the realms of visual arts, video, performance, pedagogy, and cultural management. Delgado’s work explores the intersections between the boy and nature, opening dialogue about identity, coloniality, extraction, health, and land. Delgado graduated from the International School of Film and Television – EICTV in Cuba. His work has been exhibited at the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Panamá, Teorética (Costa Rica)/Fresh Milk (Barbados), New York Latin American Art Triennial, and the Center for Visual Arts (Denver). Imani Harrington (she/her) is a writer, author and conceptual artist who has documented on the conditions of women since the age of 25. She was an editor for the anthology Positive/Negative: Women of Color and HIV/AIDS: A Collection of Plays (2002) and her play Love & Danger (1995) was among the first to address women and HIV. Her other titles include The Communal Plays and Other Narratives, On Writing I, ISSHOWAT, andHouse of Leaven. David Oscar Harvey (he/him) is a psychotherapist and psychoanalysist-in-training, living in Philadelphia. His essay film on HIV criminalization, RED RED RED, has screened at film festivals and art spaces internationally. His writing on identity, HIV/AIDS and film and media have appeared in numerous publications. Harvey is an active member in the artist and activist collective What Would an HIV Doula Do?. Mariana Iacono (she/her) is a social worker, media activist, and educator who works with networks of people living with HIV in Latin America and the Hispanic Caribbean for more than 10 years. She is a co-founder of several HIV organizations in Argentina including Argentine Network of Positive Youth and Adolescents (RAJAP), RAP+30, and Latin American HIV-Positive Youth Network (J+LAC). She currently manages promotion and communication strategy for J+LAC, focusing on feminist issues and building a coalition of young people towards Cairo+20. Iacono’s writing has been published in Volcánicas, Midia Ninja, Vice, Anfibia, Tiempo Argentino, Hoja Blanca, and Revista Nómada. nixie (she/they) is a transfemme HIV+ multimedia artist, writer, and parent, based in Belgium. Her artwork has addressed HIV and genealogy, consent in gay spaces, the joy of parenthood, mourning, and the celebration of loss. She works mainly through mediums of text, video, performance, textile and painting. Vasilios Papapitsios (they/he) is an LA-based writer, filmmaker and artist originally from the South whose work transmutes stigma and trauma with a flare for the fantastical. Vasilios has contributed to projects for MasterClass, AwesomenessTV, and Emmy-nominated intersectional media platform OTV – Open Television. They were recognized as a Notable Writer in the 2021 OUTFEST screenwriting lab and as an artivist storyteller in residence with UCLA’s Through Positive Eyes. Vasilios creates very strange, frank, and whimsical worlds for us to wander off in, blending genres and blurring boundaries within advocacy, education, and entertainment.
“The film – the latest in the Exhibition on Screen series – blends beautiful footage of the painting and its setting in the Belvedere Museum in Vienna with insightful criticism from curators and scholars to bring the artwork to life. There is a lot to unpack.” – The Guardian
Synopsis:
This documentary delves into the detail and passion surrounding Gustav Klimt’s exquisite artwork, his scandalous life, the decadent Art Nouveau movement, and the painting that has become one of the most recognized and reproduced in the world—The Kiss.“A portrait of the determination and grit—and self-absorption—possessed by athletes who push themselves to their limits.” – RogerEbert.com “…will have you cheering.” – ABC News “It is quite the tale of heroism and courage in the face of adversity, as well as the importance of teamwork and never giving up.” – Entertainment Weekly
Synopsis:
A remarkable true story of tenacity, friendship and the triumph of the human spirit, NYAD recounts a riveting chapter in the life of world-class athlete Diana Nyad. Three decades after giving up marathon swimming in exchange for a prominent career as a sports journalist, at the age of 60, Diana (four-time Academy Award nominee Annette Bening) becomes obsessed with completing an epic swim that always eluded her: the 110 mile trek from Cuba to Florida, often referred to as the “Mount Everest” of swims. Determined to become the first person to finish the swim without a shark cage, Diana goes on a thrilling, four-year journey with her best friend and coach Bonnie Stoll (two-time Academy Award winner Jodie Foster) and a dedicated sailing team.“A darkly funny, and often truthful, look at the rapid hysteria of our real-world cancel culture.” – Huffington Post “It’s undeniably enjoyable and sharp, a reminder that a great idea can go a long way.” – RogerEbert.com “This is an ambitious, often provocative interrogation of masculinity, cancel culture, social media, and the power of celebrity through a humorous lens.” – Screen International
Synopsis:
Hapless family man Paul Matthews (Nicolas Cage) finds his life turned upside down when millions of strangers suddenly start seeing him in their dreams. But when his nighttime appearances take a nightmarish turn, Paul is forced to navigate his newfound stardom, in this wickedly entertaining comedy from writer-director Kristoffer Borgli (Sick of Myself) and producer Ari Aster.“Never less than compelling, her [Helen Mirren] work here feels true from scene to scene.” – Financial Times “Golda is unusually blunt about the internal devastation that comes with overseeing military operations.” – Wall Street Journal “For those with a particular interest in Meir, Israel, or 20th century Middle East history, there’s enough here to hold a viewer’s attention.” – ReelViews “Mirren portrays Meir in her darkest days at the height of the 1973 Yom Kippur War with empathy and loving subtlety. It’s hard to imagine anyone doing it better…” – San Francisco Chronicle
Synopsis:
Golda is a ticking-clock thriller set during the tense 19 days of the Yom Kippur War in 1973. Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir (Helen Mirren), faced with the potential of Israel’s complete destruction, must navigate overwhelming odds, a skeptical cabinet, and a complex relationship with US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (Liev Schreiber), with millions of lives in the balance. Her tough leadership and compassion would ultimately decide the fate of her nation and leave her with a controversial legacy around the world.“This elaborate documentary navigates adroitly through the professional and the personal aspects of a very full life.” – Deadline Hollywood Daily “Directors Miri Navasky, Karen O’Connor and Maeve O’Boyle finally do an impressive and affecting job of hitting all those marks, in a film whose chief sin may just be that it doesn’t run about a half-hour longer.” – Variety “Anyone with an interest in the key artists of the counterculture movement will find much to appreciate here.” – Hollywood Reporter
Synopsis:
Neither a conventional biopic nor a traditional concert film, JOAN BAEZ I AM A NOISE is a raw and intimate portrait of the legendary folk singer and activist that shifts back and forth through time as it follows Joan on her final tour and delves into her extraordinary archive, including newly discovered home movies, diaries, artwork, therapy tapes, and audio recordings. Baez is remarkably revealing about her life on and off stage — from her lifelong emotional struggles to her civil rights work with MLK and a heartbreaking romance with a young Bob Dylan. A searingly honest look at a living legend, this film is a compelling and deeply personal exploration of an iconic artist who has never told the full truth of her life, as she experienced it, until now.“[A] consistently smart, funny movie about people who are easy to root for and like the ones we know.” – RogerEbert.com “It’s the warmest cinematic experience you’ll have all year.” – The New York Post “The vibes are immaculate from the start and only grow more so as the characters gradually start to become as detailed as the world that The Holdovers constructs around them.” – indieWire
Synopsis:
This film follows a curmudgeonly instructor (Paul Giamatti) at a New England prep school who is forced to remain on campus during Christmas break to babysit the handful of students with nowhere to go. Eventually he forms an unlikely bond with one of them — a damaged, brainy troublemaker (newcomer Dominic Sessa) — and with the school’s head cook, who has just lost a son in Vietnam (Da’Vine Joy Randolph).“Both a staggering piece of cinema and an urgent social probe and trial that is universal despite its historic and cultural specificity.” – The New Indian Express “…it shocks, resounds, and haunts.” – Vanity Fair “It’s a masterpiece.” – Rolling Stone “The best performance of Leonardo DiCaprio’s entire career.” – indieWire 97% on Rotten Tomatoes
Synopsis:
Based on David Grann’s broadly lauded best-selling book, “Killers of the Flower Moon” is set in 1920s Oklahoma and depicts the serial murder of members of the oil-wealthy Osage Nation, a string of brutal crimes that came to be known as the Reign of Terror. Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, and Brendan Fraser“The occasional exposure flares and soundtrack sync pops reminds us this is a movie, but also that we’re watching what’s raw and possible in art and life, that it’s good to be open to wherever images and sounds may take us.” – Los Angeles Times “The film’s provocations have a playfulness and generosity that are enormously appealing.” – The New York Times “A narrative that maintains a stolid demeanor even as it takes the oddest turns.” – RogerEbert.com 91% on Rotten Tomatoes
Synopsis:
Introverted and unqualified, Eva is unexpectedly tasked with foleying the sound for a commercial featuring a horse. As she slowly acclimates to the new job, her obsession with creating the perfect equine sounds grows into something more tangible. Eva harnesses this new physicality, becoming more confident and empowered, and lures an unassuming botanist into an intriguing game of submission. Shot on lush 16mm, Piaffe is a visceral journey into control, gender, and artifice. In German with English subtitles.“Truly captivating.” – Empire Magazine “It’s a treat for fans…and a chance for the uninitiated to tune in to the band that has come to personify postmodernist rock ‘n’ roll.” – Washington Post “Stop Making Sense successfully captures almost everything that was great about the Talking Heads, and there’s no better endorsement of a concert film than that.” – Austin Chronicle 100% on Rotten Tomatoes
Synopsis:
For its 40th anniversary, newly restored in pristine 4K, experience/re-experience the greatest concert film of all time. Director Jonathan Demme captures the frantic energy and artsy groove of Talking Heads in this concert movie shot at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre in 1983. The band’s frontman, David Byrne, first appears on an empty stage, armed with only an acoustic guitar, and is gradually joined by bassist Tina Weymouth, drummer Chris Frantz, keyboardist Jerry Harrison and a cadre of backup singers as they perform the band’s hits, culminating in an iconic performance featuring Byrne in an enormous suit.
“Enthralling! Revels in Carlos Santana’s musical life force.” – Variety
Synopsis:
A music industry legend for 50 years and a 10-time Grammy-winning global sensation, as well as a recipient of a Kennedy Center Honor and a Billboard Century award, Carlos Santana continues to be one of the music world’s premiere artists, blending jazz, blues, and the Mariachi sound with a rock n’ roll spirituality and a sense of connection to music’s primal connection to our deepest emotions. The electric documentary CARLOS utilizes new interviews with Santana and his family alongside extraordinary, never-before-seen archival footage — including home video recordings Santana himself made; concert footage; and behind-the-scenes moments — as two-time Emmy-winning director Rudy Valdez (The Sentence; Through Our Eyes; We Are: The Brooklyn Saints) creates an intimate, rich documentary about a man whose sound casts a spell on fans who love — as one of Santana’s famous titles says — “how his rhythm goes.”“A luminous, fascinating look at the life and times of Mary Cassatt.” – Sydney Arts Guide
Synopsis:
Mary Cassatt made a career painting the lives of the women around her. Her radical images showed them as intellectual, curious and engaging, which was a major shift in the way women appeared in art. Presenting her astonishing prints, pastels and paintings, this film introduces us to the often-overlooked Impressionist whose own career was as full of contradiction as the women she painted. Her artwork is some of the finest of the period. She printed, sketched and painted dozens of images of mothers and children yet she never married or had children herself. She was a classically trained artist but chose to join a group of Parisian radicals – the Impressionists – a movement that transformed the language of art. She was as much a part of the group as Degas, Monet or Renoir.
The world’s most eminent Cassatt curators and scholars reveal a riveting tale of great social and cultural change; a time when women were fighting for their rights and the language of art was completely re-written. Mary Cassatt and her modern women were at the heart of it all.
