All About Agnès March 7–24, 2019

Istanbul Modern Cinema presents the most comprehensive retrospective in Turkey to date of Agnés Varda, one of the most innovative and liberal creators in the history of cinema, a leading representative of the feminist movement, and a pioneer of French New Wave.

For Agnès Varda cinema is cinema; it does not discriminate between format, genre or duration. She directs her films using a method, which she defines as cinematic writing (cinécriture). As interdisciplinary works, her films incorporate painting, photography, installation and literature. Abolishing the boundaries between fiction and documentary, subjective and objective, Varda, as a “cinematic writer” makes herself felt even in her films where she isn’t the subject.

Agnès Varda first entered the world of cinema with La Pointe Courte, 1954 in which she depicts the story of fishermen living in a town near Sète, where she grew up. Varda produced five short documentaries following Parallel Lives, which is considered as one of the pioneers of French New Wave by celebrated film historian Georges Sadoul. Following these documentaries was Cléo from 5 to 7 (Cléo de 5 à 7, 1962), which was nominated for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. As one of the 343 women signatories to Simone de Beauvoir’s manifesto for the legalization of abortion, Varda has been active in the women’s liberation movement, and in this respect her Women Reply: Our Bodies, Our Sex (Réponse de Femmes: Notre Corps, Notre Sexe, 1975) is of utmost significance. During the 1990s, Varda directed documentaries in dedication to her late husband, famous director Jacques Demy, and in the 2000s she created The Gleaners and I (Les Glaneurs et la Glaneuse, 2000), followed by The Gleaners and I: Two Years Later (Les Glaneurs et la Glaneuse... Deux Ans Après, 2002), The Beaches of Agnès (Les Plages D'Agnès, 2008), Faces Places (Visages, Villages, 2017)that she co-created with photographer and installation artist JR, and her autobiographical film, Varda by Agnès (Varda par Agnès, 2019) which premiered at the 2019 Berlin Film Festival and instantly became a favorite of young generations.

“Alive and curious” for 91 years, Agnès Varda has been creating cinema for the past 65 years, adding new awards to her repertoire which includes Legion d’Honneur, René Clair Award and Academy Honorary Award, and continuing her inspirational “dance with cinema”.

Talk: The Cinema of Agnès Varda
Thursday, March 7, 19.00
Venue: French Cultural Center in İstanbul

Our guest Didier Rouget talks about his long working relationship with Agnès Varda and on the director’s cinema. The talk is moderated by Müge Turan and Alin Taşçıyan.