The Menil presents a screening of Francois de Menil’s films Niki de Saint Phalle (1982; 15:42 min.), Tinguely: A Kinetic Cosmos (1970s; 32:18 min.), and Hon (1966; 8:38 min.), followed by a discussion with the filmmaker and Senior Curator Michelle White.
In the summer of 1966, de Menil filmed the disassembly and destruction of Niki de Saint Phalle’s largest Nana figure, Hon—en katedral [She—A Cathedral], a colorful sculptural environment in the form of a recumbent pregnant woman, created with the help of artists Jean Tinguely and Per Olof Ultvedt for the Moderna Museet in Stockholm. For a decade or more afterwards, de Menil continued to film Tinguely and Saint Phalle at home and at work. Initially intended to be a single film, the footage eventually took the form of two shorter intimate portraits of the artists.
