Brutal(1980)

ARTASERSE(it)

A one-of-a-kind cinematographic experiment. A grotesque fairy tale, staged in the real lives of the characters. A completely self-produced movie, designed and directed by two visual artists, with the purpose of telling the tale of Artaserse, a retired worker, boxer, trainer and life-long painter. Everything is staged in an industrial, now decadent Terni; like a steel bay without the sea, here it's difficult to dream about becoming an artist. This movie is like a suburban western movie; the boxer and the painting dancing the communal square dance together, in life and death, the meeting-match between Artaserse and an allegorical and remorseless art world, and more generically, the battle of all the colorful characters, appearing throughout.

Goya(it)

Presents life in 18th century Spain as the painter Francisco de Goya showed it to us.

Metamorphose: M.C. Escher, 1898-1972(en)

A documentary about the life and works of the artist M. C. Escher. Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972) usually referred to as M. C. Escher, was a Dutch graphic artist. He is known for his often mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints. These feature impossible constructions, explorations of infinity, architecture, and tessellations.

Democracy Is ...(en)

The film is a controversy on democracy. Is our society really democratic? Can everyone be part of it? Or is the act of being part in democracy dependent to the access on technology, progression or any resources of information, as philosophers like Paul Virilio or Jean Baudrillard already claimed?

Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price(en)

This documentary takes the viewer on a deeply personal journey into the everyday lives of families struggling to fight Goliath. From a family business owner in the Midwest to a preacher in California, from workers in Florida to a poet in Mexico, dozens of film crews on three continents bring the intensely personal stories of an assault on families and American values.

The Real Beauty and the Beast(en)

It's a condition known as "hypertrichosis" or "Ambras Syndrome," but in the 1500s it would transform one man into a national sensation and iconic fairy-tale character. His name: Petrus Gonsalvus, more commonly known today as the hairy hero of Beauty and the Beast.

Rietveld Houses: A piece of furniture to live in(nl)

In 2024, the iconic Rietveld Schröder House in Utrecht will celebrate its 100th anniversary. Gerrit Rietveld designed and built the house in close collaboration with his secret lover and creative partner Truus Schröder. Rietveld himself did not build his houses for eternity; he thought a life cycle of 50 years was sufficient. But the current owners of houses designed by Rietveld think differently about this. They pull out all the stops to renovate and preserve their Rietveld houses.

Altamira: el origen del arte(es)

A documentary to 'rediscover' the so called Sistine Chapel of Rock Art and to tell the story of the discovery of a cave and some paintings that astonished the world 138 years ago. Filming this documentary lead its director, José Luis López Linares, through many rock caves around the world, grasping information about the life of the Magdalenian man -who lived twenty thousand years ago- and about an art form, the paintings, that make Altamira "the Prado museum of prehistory".

Pompeii and the Roman Villa(en)

Narrated by Sir Derek Jacobi - star of the landmark television series "I, Claudius" - this documentary explores art and culture around the Bay of Naples before Mount Vesuvius erupted in AD 79. The bay was then the most fashionable destination for vacationing Romans. Julius Caesar, emperors, and senators were among those who owned sumptuous villas along its shores. Artists flocked to the region to create frescoes, sculpture, and luxurious objects in gold, silver, and glass for villa owners as well as residents of Pompeii and other towns in the shadow of Vesuvius. The film concludes with the story of the discovery of Pompeii and Herculaneum from the 18th century onward.

Faces Places(fr)

Director Agnès Varda and photographer/muralist JR journey through rural France and form an unlikely friendship.

Kandinsky(fr)

Colour, form, area - this is the formula of the greatest pioneer of abstract painting. Kandinsky came to art late in life, but his impact through Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) and Bauhaus paved the way for modern art. In 1913, he created one of the first abstract pictures, the theoretical basis of which was inspired by his essay Uber das Geistige in der Kunst (On the Spiritual in Art). Accompanied by Mussorgsky's Pictures From An Exhibition Labarthe goes on a sensual journey which makes the soul resound with colours and forms. "A picture has to resound and must be bathed in an inner glow." Kandinsky

Violin Film #1 (Playing The Violin As Fast As I Can)(en)

Violin Film #1 (Playing the Violin as Fast as I Can), is one of several 1967-68 films featuring Nauman's violin-playing, in which the production of sound is subjected to procedural strategies that problematize its status as music and performance.

Violin Tuned D.E.A.D(en)

In an earlier film, Playing A Note on the Violin While I Walk Around the Studio (Violin #1), Nauman played a single note on the violin as he walked around his studio. In this video work, he remains in a stationary position while he plays four strings together. (These have been tuned to the notes of the title, as opposed to the normal G, D, A, and E.) The camera is fixed and turned on its side.

Traces: The Kabul Museum 1988(ja)

The Kabul National Museum, once known as the "face of Afghanistan," was destroyed in 1993. We filmed the most important cultural treasures of the still-intact museum in 1988: ancient Greco-Roman art and antiquitied of Hellenistic civilization, as well as Buddhist sculpture that was said to have mythology--the art of Gandhara, Bamiyan, and Shotorak among them. After the fall of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan in 1992, some seventy percent of the contents of the museum was destroyed, stolen, or smuggled overseas to Japan and other countries. The movement to return these items is also touched upon. The footage in this video represents that only film documentation of the Kabul Museum ever made.

Empire of the Nude: The Victorian Nude(en)

The Victorian era is often cited for its lack of sexuality, but as this documentary reveals, the period's artists created a strong tradition surrounding the classical nude figure, which spread from the fine arts to more common forms of expression. The film explains how 19th-century artists were inspired by ancient Greek and Roman works to highlight the naked form, and how that was reflected in the evolving cultural attitudes toward sex.

Laerte-se(pt)

In this film, Laerte conjugates the body in the feminine, and scrutinizes concepts and prejudices. Not in search of an identity, but in search of un-identities. Laerte creates and sends creatures to face reality in the fictional world of comic strips as a vanguard of the self. And, on the streets, the one who becomes the fiction of a real character. Laerte, of all the bodies, and of none, complicates all binaries. In following Laerte, this documentary chooses to clothe the nudity beyond the skin we inhabit.

The Art of Incarceration(en)

Narrated by Uncle Jack Charles and seen through the eyes of Indigenous prisoners at Victoria’s Fulham Correctional Centre, this documentary explores how art and culture can empower Australia's First Nations people to transcend their unjust cycles of imprisonment.

Rich Media, Poor Democracy(en)

Robert McChesney lays the blame for the US's current state of affairs squarely at the doors of the corporate boardrooms of big media, which far from delivering on their promises of more choice and more diversity, have organized a system characterized by a lack of competition, homogenization of opinion and formulaic programming.

Pyhä(fi)

Dolorès Marat: The Wave(fr)

A passionate photographer from an early age, Dolorès Marat spent much of her life in photo labs, developing shots for fashion magazines. In the early 1990s, at the dawn of her forties, she decided to devote herself to her personal work. Today, she is exhibited worldwide. With her Leica camera in hand, Dolorès Marat takes an intimate look at her surroudings. She shots on the spot, as the blue hour settles. In her photographs, a dream-like strangeness overlaps the triviality of everyday life. Director Armelle Sèvre, also a photographer, wanted to see the world through Dolorès’ eyes. Together, the two women will scour the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, in search of a wave… Carried along by a bewitching soundtrack, this film dives in the enigmatic, hazy and colorful universe of a singular artist.