Delacroix

Human and Animal Movement Expressed in Drawings

`The great French painter, whose work marks the beginning of modern art, and whom - to name only a few - Cézanne, Manet, Renoir, Van Gogh, considered as their master, has left a vast number of drawings, which remained unknown to the public until after his death. Less finished and complete than his pictures, they show in a striking way the genius of Delacroix, the boldness of his imagination, the complete independence from convention and school tradition. Every time he drew is proof of the revolution he started. He opened the eyes of his generation, his influence reaching far beyond his own time and country.' In these words the scholar Kurt Badt, one of this century's first `discoverers' of Delacroix's drawings, introduced them to the public in the 1940s. This film, however, makes use of techniques not available to the authors of the few books on Delacroix as a draftsman. As Edouard Roditi first acclaimed it in the New York journal Art Voices, `Anthony Roland has tried, in his film on Delacroix, to suggest to us the workings of the artist's mind by revealing the world of his drawings as if it were the real or imagined world that Delacroix depicts. Out of the four thousand Delacroix drawings in the collection of the Paris Louvre, Roland photographed four hundred, then used eighty-three of these in the film as it is now shown. Within a wash-drawing landscape, [the] camera slowly retreats from a close-up of details in the background to the foreground, when at last we see the whole drawing as if we were looking back on the way that we ourselves have just traveled. In a quick-cut sequence of stills of various sketches of animals in action, we gain the impression of watching real animals at play, as the artist saw them when he sketched them. The continuity of such an art movie is poetic, in terms of the aesthetics of the motion-picture ... As a work of art in itself, such a film helps one to understand and appreciate an artist's work far more subtly and dramatically than any more traditional art-documentary.' There is no narration.

`Delacroix is magic. We seem to be sharing the artist's most intimate thoughts in a strange land where the creativity of Delacroix is perfectly matched with the equally creative powers of the film-maker ... a very strong feeling for the artist's style, ideas, and moods ... notable for unity of purpose and coherence, for synchronization of visuals and music ... shows real feeling for the artist.' Vancouver International Film Festival

`Startling musical score; excellent photography; unusual treatment of subject; artistically authentic ... turned stills into a moving scene showing the art and genius of the artist ... exciting ... intimate; unity like a poem.' Canada's Documentary Film Festival

For more information see section 26

© 1998-2008 The Roland Collection & Pira Intl.