National Museum
A “direct cinema” documentary, National Museum, explores the art and inner workings of the major art institution in Kiev, Ukraine.
Restoration specialists, curators, art handlers, designers and, of course, visitors are fascinating characters in this unhurried, poignant and occasionally funny survey of what is cherished and revered by the nation of forty five million.
Curating, mounting and opening of two special exhibitions – one dedicated to the Ukrainian baroque and another one to a prominent avant-garde artist, Alexander Bogomazov –are the defining events in the narrative structure of the film.
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One can say that national museums are repositories of the national subconscious. This is certainly the case with the Ukrainian National Museum in Kyiv.
In that sense my artistic goal was to show the lingering consequences of the long years of communist oppression in Ukraine – the executions of artists and the neglect and destruction of art and cultural objects, while observing something conspicuously undramatic – the everyday life of museum curators and staff from one exhibition to another.
Andrei Zagdansky
Festivals & Awards
Releaseд August 18, 2021
XII Odessa International Film Festival, 2021
National Competition Program
Golden Duke Nominee
Ukrainian Film Critics Awards 2021
Best Documentary Nomination
Ptah, Ukrainian Film Festival in the UK,
December 2023
Fundraisers–screenings to benefit Ukraine
May 16, 2022, the Avon Theatre, Stamford, CT, USA
May 5, 2022, the Rosendale Theatre, Rosendale, NY, USA.The proceeds from ticket sales and donations totaled $1,718.22 transferred to a relief charity Cash for Refugees.
April 28, 2022. the Ukrainian Museum, NYC, NY, USA.The proceeds from ticket sales and donations totaled $1,00.00 transferred to a relief charity Get Back Alive.
March 18, 2022, the Scandinavia House, NYC, USA.
The proceeds from ticket ales and donations totaled $4,545.00 transferred to a relief charity Cash for Refugees
Press
Andrei Zagdansky: National Museum
KinoKultura
reviewed by Brinton Tench Coxe © 2022
Andrei Zagdansky’s National Museum guides the viewer through space and across time, inviting us to recognize the institution less as a solid edifice or fixed location and more as a series of interconnecting moving pieces. The film also leads viewers on an interactive and immersive tour of the working components and stages of production involved in setting up and dismantling exhibitions. To capture this process…
«Національний музей» Андрія Загданського — це всуціль документальний фільм, втім, так само концептуальний (зроблений ще торік, але через карантин відкладений на поличку часу навмисно, щоб бути показаним в Одесі саме офлайн). Ми спостерігаємо, як усередині музею, протягом як мінімум трьох сезонів — осені, зими й весни — проходять ремонти й підготовка до експозицій українських ікон кінця XVII сторіччя і картин Богомазова початку ХХ століття, де розказується про унікальність і тих, і тих робіт, і про титанічний труд щодо їх реставрації. Але рефреном ідуть екстер’єрні й інтер’єрні кадри-свідчення розвалу самого музею. І цей контраст набагато ширший за контекстом, стосуючись, метафорично, не тільки самого приміщення у столиці на початку вулиці Грушевського, а й, вірогідно, всього суспільства в цілому,адже як ти можеш говорити про високі матерії, якщо ноги в тебе глиняні й от-от завалишся?
Ярослав Підгора-Гвяздовський "Детектор М"
Credits
Conceived and directed by Andrei Zagdansky
Cameramen:
Igor Ivanov, Vladimir Guyevsky,
Andrei Zagdansky, Andrei Noga
Sound Borys Peter,
Composer J.S.Bach,
Producers: Gennady Kofman and Andrei Zagdansky
A co–production of AZ Films llc and MaGiKa Film
with financial support of Ukrainian Ministry of Culture
© 2021 Ministry of Culture, Ukraine/
© 2021 AZ Films LLC/
© 2021 MaGiKa Films
All rights reserved.
Andrei Zagdansky (center) and DoP Vladimir Guyevsky (on the right) on the set of “National Museum”
Photo by Oles’ Badio.
Signe Baumane and Andrei Zagdansky during Q&A after the screening at the Rosendale Theatre.
May 5, 2022. Photo by Alexei Zagdansky