English
Adventures in Editing I
By Paul Duncan
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We attacked the collection and I made my selection of images for the book. The images were fantastic, often large pristine prints made by the photographers. Many of them had never been published before. While Andrea sorted out some of the administration involved (in Italy this involves lots of talking, emails, phone calls and faxes as everybody slowly finds out what the rules are) I walked over to the gallery space devoted to Michelangelo's paintings. Michelangelo had become enchanted by the rock formations of America whilst scouting and filming Zabriskie Point (1970) and painted a series of small pieces, which he then blew up in size, just as the photographer blows up the photos in Blow-Up (1966). This enlarging process had changed the texture of the paintings and Antonioni used this in his work. The paintings are both organic and have an organising form, which echo his films.
Returning to Rome, I met Michelangelo again, and as Andrea described some of the photos I had found to il maestro, tears started to well up in his eyes. This made me feel emotional too. Although Michelangelo had his own reasons to be emotional, it suddenly dawned on me that the work of one of the greatest film artists of modern times was hardly available for anybody to see, and perhaps this book could champion his work for a new generation.
That visit was very interesting in another way. Michelangelo now spends a lot of time painting and he was painting whilst I was there. He draws lines and shapes on the page, makes adjustments where necessary, and then mixes/selects colours. An assistant helps to fill in the colours for him. As I watched, his assistant argued with il maestro (I do not understand Italian but I'm pretty sure she was questioning il maestro's choice of colour for one of the sections). When she left for a moment, Michelangelo picked up a small pot of paint and laid it down on the paper to visualise how it would look. He then selected another colour and looked at me, asking what I thought. I shrugged and so did he, with an amused expression on his face.
The reason I mention the paintings is because when I first met Michelangelo in July, I had seen several of his recent paintings and adored them. Enrica kindly let me have copies of some of them and an inscription by Antonioni's longtime collaborator Tonino Guerra mentioned the influence of a painter named Giacomo Balla. I had never seen the work of Balla, so was somewhat at a loss. The following day I had the morning free, so I walked to a nearby park and happened upon Rome's Museum of Modern Art. Entering it, I found much to enjoy, including a dozen or so examples of Balla's art. So, completely by accident, I continued my research on Antonioni and augmented my art education.
In my own roundabout way, this is the point of my story: the research never ends. You have to recognise every coincidence and act on it.
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
We attacked the collection and I made my selection of images for the book. The images were fantastic, often large pristine prints made by the photographers. Many of them had never been published before. While Andrea sorted out some of the administration involved (in Italy this involves lots of talking, emails, phone calls and faxes as everybody slowly finds out what the rules are) I walked over to the gallery space devoted to Michelangelo's paintings. Michelangelo had become enchanted by the rock formations of America whilst scouting and filming Zabriskie Point (1970) and painted a series of small pieces, which he then blew up in size, just as the photographer blows up the photos in Blow-Up (1966). This enlarging process had changed the texture of the paintings and Antonioni used this in his work. The paintings are both organic and have an organising form, which echo his films.
Returning to Rome, I met Michelangelo again, and as Andrea described some of the photos I had found to il maestro, tears started to well up in his eyes. This made me feel emotional too. Although Michelangelo had his own reasons to be emotional, it suddenly dawned on me that the work of one of the greatest film artists of modern times was hardly available for anybody to see, and perhaps this book could champion his work for a new generation.
That visit was very interesting in another way. Michelangelo now spends a lot of time painting and he was painting whilst I was there. He draws lines and shapes on the page, makes adjustments where necessary, and then mixes/selects colours. An assistant helps to fill in the colours for him. As I watched, his assistant argued with il maestro (I do not understand Italian but I'm pretty sure she was questioning il maestro's choice of colour for one of the sections). When she left for a moment, Michelangelo picked up a small pot of paint and laid it down on the paper to visualise how it would look. He then selected another colour and looked at me, asking what I thought. I shrugged and so did he, with an amused expression on his face.
The reason I mention the paintings is because when I first met Michelangelo in July, I had seen several of his recent paintings and adored them. Enrica kindly let me have copies of some of them and an inscription by Antonioni's longtime collaborator Tonino Guerra mentioned the influence of a painter named Giacomo Balla. I had never seen the work of Balla, so was somewhat at a loss. The following day I had the morning free, so I walked to a nearby park and happened upon Rome's Museum of Modern Art. Entering it, I found much to enjoy, including a dozen or so examples of Balla's art. So, completely by accident, I continued my research on Antonioni and augmented my art education.
In my own roundabout way, this is the point of my story: the research never ends. You have to recognise every coincidence and act on it.
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Still from 'Blow-Up' (1966). As Thomas blows up his photos, the real images become abstract and start to resemble his friend's paintings. They lose form and 'disappear', just as each character in the film disappears. (c) Warner Home Video