FC2Video

To get this DVD: www.microcinemadvd.com

Award-winning director Damian Pettigrew (Fellini: I'm a Born Liar) offers this definitive portrait of Balthus, a modern artist whose work was nonetheless out of step with most modern movements. His huge canvases with their thickly applied paint feature dreamy adolescent girls in enigmatic poses, resulting in an erotically charged and oddly disorienting style.
Pettigrew's beautifully composed documentary highlights the painter's complex creative pocess as he films the artist at work on his studio in the Swiss mountains. Famous friends and family members bare witness to the great artist's life in exclusive interviews, accompanied by photos by such luminaries as Henri Cartier-Bresson and Irving Penn. This is a rare insider's look at one of the 20th century's most intriguing painters.

Two shorts complement the film with interpretations of the great man's work and artistic process.