The Hollywood History of Art

Speaker: Christopher Frayling

Ever since the dawn of the sound era, Hollywood has made a series of elaborate feature films about the lives of the great visual artists, including (among many others) Charles Laughton as Rembrandt, George Sanders as Gauguin, Charlton Heston as Michelangelo and Salma Hayek as Frida Kahlo.

These films have represented the lives of artists in ways that 'chime' with public expectations and public attitudes - with stories that take audiences on a journey from garret to gallery to glamour to gutter to grave. So, although they are often dismissed out of hand by art historians and curators, the films can tell us a great deal about how art and artists have entered the cultural bloodstream of modern Western societies.

Join historian, broadcaster and writer Christopher Frayling, author of The Hollywood History of Art, for a richly illustrated behind-the-scenes journey into Tinsel Town’s history of art.

What can these films reveal about the changing public image of the visual artist? What assumptions did Hollywood screenwriters and filmmakers make about awareness of the history of art in society at large? And what assumptions did they reflect/ promote about the artists' private lives - as well as their gender and ethnicity? What was the background to the making of these films? And what impact have they had on the real art world - its exhibitions, auctions, collections, and artists?

Portrait image credit: Dave Brolan/Reel Art Press

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Host or Publisher York Festival of Ideas