In Le Grand Cirque Calder 1927 (1955, 43 min), Jean Painlevé films his friend Alexander Calder animating, with voice and gesture, the miniature circus that he made at the end of the 1920s. Made of very simple materials, the characters perform astonishing numbers using a few strings, elastics or wires. This rare “document” (as the title card announces) on a moving work is also a living portrait of the brilliant sculptor-tinkerer that was Calder, known for his Mobiles.
Bluebeard (1936, 13 min) is one of the first color animated films. Using plastic reinforced with metal, the sculptor René Bertrand, helped by his three young children, modeled each character in Perrault’s tale to produce, in Painlevé’s words, a “fairy tale in animated sculpture”.
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Jacques-Prévert Library, Paul-Éluard room
Le Quasar
Cherbourg-en-Cotentin
