Matthew Barney:
Cremaster and Beyond
“Ultimately the most important American artist of his generation because his imagination is so big . . . Art is supposed to stick in your mind, and sometimes your craw. Barney’s films do both.”--Michael Kimmelman, The New York Times
“The CREMASTERS can be laughed at or laughed with or laughed off. But their energy and invention can’t be denied, and neither, I think, can their strange, unworldly innocence.”--Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
Avant-garde sculptor/filmmaker Matthew Barney’s colorful, highly symbolic, metaphor-laden films have attracted legions of fans, from students to seasoned connoisseurs and critics of high art. The films also have their detractors, including a number of film critics equally passionate in their skepticism. Whichever side you’re on, there’s no doubt that the prolific artist has created a body of work to be reckoned with.
The release of the feature documentary MATTHEW BARNEY: NO RESTRAINT suggests that this is an ideal time to survey the film work of Matthew Barney. NO RESTRAINT plays for a run the week of February 2--8. The director’s CREMASTER CYCLE and DRAWING RESTRAINT 9 have multiple screenings on selected dates throughout the month.
--Barbara Scharres
Reduced admission for MCA Members!
Members of Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art with valid MCA membership card admitted for $5 to any Matthew Barney screenings.
feature films
CREMASTER 1 1996, Matthew Barney, USA, 40 min.
With Marti Domination, Gemma Bourdon Smith
CREMASTER 2
1999, Matthew Barney, USA, 79 min.
With Norman Mailer, Matthew Barney
CREMASTER 1, tracing the spark of an idea, presents an homage to Busby Berkeley against the Astroturfed environs of a football stadium accessorized by the Goodyear blimp as the kickoff to Barney’s metaphorical exploration of the pre-birth inception of male gender. The inimitable Marti Domination demonstrates anatomical models with the aid of grapes and a chorus line.
CREMASTER 2 takes the notorious execution by firing squad of convicted murderer Gary Gilmore as the artist’s metaphor for “a character in conflict with his destiny.” Harry Houdini, Norman Mailer, the 1893 Columbian Exposition, the Bonneville Salt Flats, and the lost tribes of Israel all figure in a loose narrative in which Barney portrays Gilmore. 35mm. (BS)
Friday, February 2, 7:45 pm
Saturday, February 3, 4:30 pm
Tuesday, February 6, 7:45 pm
Wednesday, February 7, 6:00 pm
CREMASTER 3
2002, Matthew Barney, USA, 182 min.
With Richard Serra, Aimee Mullins, Matthew Barney
“Matthew Barney delivers his masterpiece in CREMASTER 3…Barney has done nothing short of digesting the entire canon of American gangsterism, the immigrant (specifically, Irish) experience and the birth of New York City.”--Scott Foundas, Variety
A depiction of the Celtic legend of Fingal and Fionn frames a mythic history of New York replete with gang wars and Irish sectarian rivalries. Barney portrays the Entered Apprentice, a First Degree Mason, challenged by the Chief Architect (artist Richard Serra), his own female alter ego, and a cheetah-woman, in the course of a fantastical rendering of the 1930 construction of the Chrysler Building. 35mm. (BS)
Saturday, February 24, 7:15 pm
Monday, February 26, 6:30 pm
CREMASTER 4
1995, Matthew Barney, USA/France/Britain, 42 min.
With Matthew Barney, Dave Molyneaux
CREMASTER 5
1997, Matthew Barney, USA, 55 min.
With Ursula Andress, Matthew Barney
CREMASTER 4, set on the Isle of Man, features the artist in the role of The Loughton Candidate, the tap-dancing redheaded descendant of a satyr. The organism resists receiving its gender assignment, while the descent of the male testicles is depicted through a host of visual metaphors.
CREMASTER 5, in the form of a five-act opera in Hungarian, celebrates the emerging of the fully formed male sexuality. Iconic Bond-girl Andress plays the Queen of Chain to Barney’s three roles as the queen’s Diva, her Magician, and her Giant. In Hungarian with English subtitles. 35mm. (BS)
Saturday, February 3, 6:45 pm
Sunday, February 4, 4:45 pm
Monday, February 5, 6:00 pm
Thursday, February 8, 7:45 pm
DRAWING RESTRAINT 9
2005, Matthew Barney, USA/Japan, 135 min.
With Matthew Barney, Björk
“DRAWING RESTRAINT 9, with its spooky parade of sinewy machines, white-robed pearl divers and the choreographed rites of two devoted lovers, marks a dazzling leap forward not for one artist, but two.”--Toronto International Film Festival catalogue
“A conceptual-nautical-ritual romance, or maybe a Shinto-shipboard-sculptural tryst.”--Randy Kennedy, The New York Times
Rituals and myths sacred in Japanese culture are re-imagined and reinterpreted through the lens of Barney’s art, with the essential collaboration of his partner Björk, who also composed the film’s striking soundtrack. Two Occidental Guests (Barney and Björk) board the whaling vessel Nisshin Maru amid great fanfare. A series of elaborately choreographed events culminate in a tea ceremony with a unique nuptial/carnal finale. Barney’s symbolic sculpture involving 45,000 pounds of liquefied Vaseline figures powerfully in the endeavor. In English, Japanese, and Icelandic with English subtitles. 35mm. (BS)
Friday, February 16, 6:00 pm
Saturday, February 17, 5:30 pm
Wednesday, February 21, 8:00 pm
Chicago premiere!
MATTHEW BARNEY: NO RESTRAINT
2006, Alison Chernick, USA, 70 min.
“Whatever audiences might have wanted to know about sculptor-filmmaker Matthew Barney, but were too embarrassed to ask is revealed.”--Leslie Felperin, Variety
“There’s Matthew Barney’s world, then there’s the one that the rest of us inhabit, where Vaseline is strictly a salve for chapped lips and other rough bits.”--Jeannette Catsoulis, The New York Times
NO RESTRAINT only begins with the making of Matthew Barney’s DRAWING RESTRAINT 9, an avant-garde extravaganza involving a Japanese whaling ship and its puzzled crew, an unthinkable mass of petroleum jelly, and the close collaboration of the artist’s longtime companion, Icelandic singer/composer Björk. NO RESTRAINT only begins with the making of Matthew Barney’s DRAWING RESTRAINT 9. A recap of the artistic highlights of Barney’s career, including clips from the CREMASTER cycle, add up to a behind-the-scenes look at the man to reveal a surprisingly humorous guy with a plain-talking rationale for his work. With or without a familiarity with Barney’s films and sculptures, this is one entertaining saga of art world showmanship on the cutting edge. DigiBeta video. (BS)
February 2-8
