SCORSESE
The National Cinema Museum is hosting the SCORSESE exhibition, a Deutsche Kinemathek and National Cinema Museum coproduction, by curators Kristina Jaspers and Nils Warnecke, within its venues at the Mole Antonelliana, from 13 June to 15 September 2013.
The new display layout at the National Cinema Museum in Turin is by curators Nicoletta Pacini and Tamara Sillo.
This first great exhibition, reaching Turin after being hosted in the Deutsche Kinemathek venues, renders tribute to the artistic genius of Martin Scorsese, one of the most famed filmmakers of our age, a great cinema stylist and archaeologist, retracing his career thanks to the particular traits of his style, which combines specific genre characteristics with a distinct narrative style. In addition to being a tribute to Martin Scorsese’s artistic work, the exhibition is a tribute to his commitment in the conservation of international cinematographic heritage, through which he is casting a bridge between the past and the future of cinema.
The exhibition will develop throughout different areas of the museum and will pinpoint Scorsese’s sources of inspiration and his particular way of working, highlighting how much his narrative art has influenced modern American cinema. The largely previously unseen items come mostly from the filmmaker’s private archive, and - as Alberto Barbera points out in his presentation for the exhibition catalogue – they are “souvenirs, fragments, impressions, objects of love and desire, like the pieces of a gigantic mosaic whose edge ends up by identifying itself with the visual monument that is Scorsese’s cinematographic work, meaning his life itself. […] A fascinating trip into the private universe of one of the most significant film directors of the late Twentieth century, a great narrator of some of the crudest and authentic realities of our age.”
The particular layout of the exhibition kicks off from the Temple Hall, the core of the museum, where a spectacular set design renders a tribute to New York, the protagonist of his films, often set in the Big Apple, specifically in Little Italy, a district once inhabited mostly by Italian immigrants, where Scorsese grew up. A map of the city will show the locations in the films – with clips from them running on 4 screens – while the side-showcases will host scenery props featuring several costumes from Gangs of New York, belonging to the National Cinema Museum collections, and the red gown worn by Michelle Pfeiffer in The age of innocence film, sourced from the Sartoria Tirelli atelier archives in Rome.
The exhibition circuit then continues along the helicoidal ramp up to level +25 to the section once dedicated to “Cinema and Television”, where the many items on display - photographs, set layouts, sketches, letters, music scores, scenery props, posters and much more – will find their setting on panels as well as in outfitted corners, embossed windows and alcoves at +25, some of them geared as small screening areas. The great amount of material is divided into thematic areas acting as leading threads through the “strong” themes in Scorsese’s cinema: Family, Brothers, Men and Women, Lonely Heroes, New York, Cinema, Cinematography, Editing and Music, each introduced by a detailed panel and alternating with screens showing sequences from the films related to that thematic area.
A novelty will be the multi-medial guide on iPad, created in collaboration with the Fondazione Diversabilia and which the National Cinema Museum began testing at the beginning if this year. Envisaged to give visitors the opportunity of a personally tailored itinerary, with multi-medial content for multi-lingual insights and for facilitating their bearings within the museum thanks to interactive maps, on the occasion of this tribute to Martin Scorsese a section has been created for temporary exhibitions. In addition to the introductory text for each thematic area, a selection of 20 works present at the exhibition has also been added, described and commented directly by Scorsese, with original audio and a transcript in English and in Italian, a “treat” that may only and exclusively be appreciated on iPad.
Completing the indoor layout, 14 large-format pictures shot by Brigitte Lacombe over the years on several of Martin Scorsese’s sets will be located on the outer railings of the Mole Antonelliana.
The exhibition will be enhanced by a catalogue published by Silvana Editoriale, by curators Kristina Jaspers and Nils Warnecke in collaboration with Nicoletta Pacini and Tamara Sillo. Besides featuring pictures of a large part of the objects on display, the volume will include a presentation by Alberto Barbera, an introduction and an essay by Rainer Rother, an essay by Kristina Jaspers and Nils Warnecke, in addition to three new interviews with Martin Scorsese, Sandy Powell (costume-designer and a triple Oscar winner) and director of photography Michael Ballhaus, presentation texts for each single area and a complete filmography.
The exhibition will be inaugurated in 13 June at 6.30 p.m. at the National Cinema Museum and Sandy Powell will be the guest of honour.
For the occasion of this exhibition, the Museum Educational Service is organising a series of family activities over weekends, with guided tours and laboratories every Sunday at 4.30 p.m. starting on 16 June and until 25 August 2013, booking is required. For further details www.museumcinema.it/educa.
With thanks to our main sponsor Gucci, sponsors Lancia and Osram, and the Consulate General of the United States of America in Milan for its kind patronage.