Art on Art
Longtime New Zealand documentary filmmaker Pietra Brettkelly was in Sudan for her documentary on landmine fallout when she met an unusual woman on a quest to adopt Sudanese twins Madit and Mongor Akit. Over a period of months, the two women reconnected in Sudan, as journeys intertwined and a film process began. Brettkelly’s subject, Vanessa Beecroft, would turn out to be a famed international contemporary art star, iconoclastic and controversial. Brettkelly and DP Jake Bryant would follow her emotional, sometimes infuriating march towards imagined motherhood with their Sony Z1 kit and an open mind. Brettkelley’s interest in revealing the contradictions of international adoption came together with Beecroft’s extraordinary story of art and life and the result was, as documentaries often are, unexpected.
In a coffee shop at the Yarrow, Pietra recounts the remarkable evolution of her film’s visual style. Her expectation of the film she would make and the visual and narrative elements that thrust themselves upon the film, reinforce the true unexpected potential of documentary storytelling. For example, the filmmakers had a small stash of Super 16, which they planned to use for scenic B-roll—the ambience of the Sudan and all. Once Beecroft’s profession—and the scale of it—was revealed, the precious celluloid got turned over to the cause of following Beecroft’s art—in her studio in New York, at exhibitions in Milan, Rome and Venice as Beecroft reflected her arduous adoption process in paint and performance.
Director Brettkelly is herself a very specific artist. She describes capturing the Sudanese people in her story as a kind of portraiture, her desire to show them in motion, at work, resolute, and moving forward, while Beecroft was often obscured, seen through textures, indirectly. Beecroft’s candor was entirely present but not in the sit-down interview manner Brettkelly initially envisioned, but in a far more complex, layered and sometimes off-hand way. Beecroft’s own preference for clean, stark images came into the film as the adoption process was documented, but ironically, once Brettkelley was free to shoot the artwork, she veered from Beecroft’s style and instead captured it with more cinematic ardor. This further contrasted with archival footage provided by Beecroft, in varying NTSC formats.
The format soup fell to editor Irena Dol, who was grateful for the release of Apple Final Cut Studio 2 and the ability to mix formats. The team graded on a Pablo at Peter Jackson’s Park Road Post, where Brettkelly wanted to subtly reinforce the burnt orange dust and lush green of the Sudan, the medical blue of New York, and the antique brown of Italy.
“I never imagined this was the story that would develop,� Brettkelly says. Or that she as an artist would end up with an artist for a subject, with all the considerable contradiction and drama that dynamic would add to an already complex human and political story.
The Art Star and the Sudanese Twins is in World Documentary competition and premieres tonight (9:15) at the Holliday Village Cinema and continues there on Saturday (3:15) and Wednesday (11:45). Also in Salt Lake at the Broadway Center on Monday (10:30). Click here for theater info
