Exhibition
Colette: Film Screening and Talkback
Wednesday, August 2 6:30-8:30 pm Buy Tickets General Audience: $25 || Member: $20 || Student: $15
2023 marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of the iconic French author, Colette (1873-1954). Groundbreaking, feminist, sometimes scandalous, Colette’s confessional novellas captured vividly the inner lives of women of all ages in Belle Époque Paris. This summer, as part of our exhibition, Hector Guimard: Art Nouveau to Modernism, we are hosting our first outdoor film and lecture series inspired by Colette’s work.
Film Synopsis:
The 2018 film Colette is the loosely biographical story of the author, starring Keira Knightley and Dominic West as her rakish husband, Willy, a publisher and legendary self-promoter. When Willy convinces Colette to ghostwrite for him a story about a young schoolgirl, he cannot anticipate it will become a bestsellerand cultural sensation. What happens next—how Colette manages their marriage, societal constraints, her own desires, and her artistic freedom—will make this Belle Époque tale feel very contemporary. The trailer is available here.
The film will be introduced by Northwestern University Professor Sarah Maza, who will set the context for the film with a primer on the visuals, narrative, as well as issues of gender and sexuality in turn of the century Paris. There will be a brief Q&A after the film.
This screening is designed for adults ages 18 and over. The film is Rated R and includes some sexuality and nudity. The film is 1h 51minutes.
Event venue change: This event will now take place in the Nickerson Ballroom, on the Museum’s Third Floor.
About the Speaker:
Sarah Maza is the Jane Long Professor in the Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University, where she specializes in the history of France from the eighteenth to the twentieth century, with a focus on social, cultural, and intellectual history. Most of her work concerns “the social imaginary,” the ways in which people in the past have understood, experienced, and represented social identities, particularly class identities.
Photo Credit: Killer Films, Number 9 Films