Varda

The legendary French filmmaker Agnès Varda, whose remarkable career began in the 1950s and has continued into the twenty-first century, produced some of her most provocative works in the United States. After temporarily relocating to California in the late sixties with her husband, Jacques Demy, Varda, inspired by the politics, youth culture, and sunshine of the San Francisco and Los Angeles areas, created three works that use documentary and fiction in various ways. She returned a decade later, and made two other fascinating portraits of outsiderness. Her five revealing, entertaining California films, encompassing shorts and features, are collected in this set, which demonstrates that Varda was as deft an artist in unfamiliar terrain as she was on her own turf.

Agnès Varda, photographer, installation artist and pioneer of the Nouvelle Vague, is an institution of French cinema. Taking a seat on a theatre stage, she uses photos and film excerpts to provide an insight into her unorthodox oeuvre.

Adoptant la forme d’une leçon de cinéma – donnée à la Fondation Cartier – Varda par Agnès est un parcours dans l’œuvre de l’incontournable cinéaste, figure de la nouvelle vague, photographe et artiste, à qui l’on doit notammentCléo de 5 à 7 (1962) ou Les Glaneurs et la glaneuse (2000). Retraçant plus de 60 ans de vie et de carrière – puisque les deux éléments s’entrelacent immanquablement sans cesse dans un cheminement tel que le sien – le documentaire s’articule en deux parties, déroulant les années et projets, influences et complicités, au gré d’extraits et d’associations libres de Varda…..

An unpredictable documentary from a fascinating storyteller, Agnès Varda's next film sheds light on her experience as a director, bringing a personal insight to what she calls "cine-writing," traveling from Rue Daguerre in Paris to Los Angeles and Beijing.

A freewheeling travelogue, a kaleidoscopic survey of the contemporary art scene, and a loving ode to creativity in all its forms, this five-part miniseries by the inimitable Agnès Varda takes us on a journey of discovery as she travels the globe—from Stockholm to St. Petersburg, Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City to Los Angeles—meeting with friends, artists, and fellow filmmakers. Along the way there are chats with titan auteurs Chris Marker (offering a window into his virtual reality world) and a 102-year-old Manoel de Oliveira (doing his best Chaplin impersonation); visits to the Hermitage Museum, the Venice Biennale, and the home of Frida Kahlo; glimpses into the studios of acclaimed visual artists like Christian Boltanski, Annette Messager, and Pierre Soulages; and Varda’s casually profound musings on everything from rivers to the Dutch masters to her own photography and installation works. Never before released in the United States, this catalog of wonders great and small is a unique invitation to see the world through the eyes of one of cinema’s most playfully perceptive artists.

A freewheeling travelogue, a kaleidoscopic survey of the contemporary art scene, and a loving ode to creativity in all its forms, this five-part miniseries by the inimitable Agnès Varda takes us on a journey of discovery as she travels the globe—from Stockholm to St. Petersburg, Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City to Los Angeles—meeting with friends, artists, and fellow filmmakers. Along the way there are chats with titan auteurs Chris Marker (offering a window into his virtual reality world) and a 102-year-old Manoel de Oliveira (doing his best Chaplin impersonation); visits to the Hermitage Museum, the Venice Biennale, and the home of Frida Kahlo; glimpses into the studios of acclaimed visual artists like Christian Boltanski, Annette Messager, and Pierre Soulages; and Varda’s casually profound musings on everything from rivers to the Dutch masters to her own photography and installation works. Never before released in the United States, this catalog of wonders great and small is a unique invitation to see the world through the eyes of one of cinema’s most playfully perceptive artists.

Varda Etienne ne s'est jamais sentie à l'aise dans la normalité. C'est la raison pour laquelle elle a toujours eu au fond d'elle cette envie insatiable, voire boulimique, de provoquer. A la télévision et à la radio, elle s'est montrée bien plus provocante qu'aucune autre femme au Québec avant elle. Varda s'est construit un personnage que, telle une déesse grecque, ses nombreux fidèles vénéraient. Toutefois, si ces derniers se délectaient de ses excentricités, de ses audaces et de ses dérapages, beaucoup d'autres se complaisaient à la haïr en attendant le faux pas qui la mènerait à la déchéance publique…

Agnès Varda, photographer, installation artist and pioneer of the Nouvelle Vague, is an institution of French cinema. Taking a seat on a theatre stage, she uses photos and film excerpts to provide an insight into her unorthodox oeuvre.

Agnès Varda, photographer, installation artist and pioneer of the Nouvelle Vague, is an institution of French cinema. Taking a seat on a theatre stage, she uses photos and film excerpts to provide an insight into her unorthodox oeuvre.