Guided tour in the exhibition Cathrine Opie - Mountains Don´t Know Their Names and film screening by Derek Jarmans Blue at Cinemateket
has drawn significant inspiration from artist and filmmaker , and the work of these two artists explores many of the same themes. For this reason, PoMo and Cinemateket invite you to a guided tour of the exhibition Catherine Opie – Mountains Don’t Know Their Names, followed by a screening of Jarman’s film Blue, presented in collaboration with Kosmorama.
The guided tour lasts approximately 45 minutes. Tickets are available for both the tour and the film, or for the film only.
“It’s also thinking about how the history of blue is used in art. Thinking about Picasso’s Blue, Derek Jarman’s film Blue, Cerulean Blue in terms of painting, Italian Renaissance. Like what does that blueness hold and why do we, why do we seek it, and why is both dawn and dusk so important for the idea of beginnings and endings.”
– Catherine Opie, in an interview with Marc-Christoph Wagner for Louisiana Channel, January 2024
Blue (1993) is the final feature film by artist and filmmaker , released just months before his death from AIDS-related complications. Through the film, Jarman challenges the prejudice and lack of political engagement surrounding the HIV and AIDS epidemic at the time.
The film presents a field of blue, reflecting the way Jarman lost his sight as a result of AIDS-related illness and came to perceive the world in shades of blue. These monochrome blue images are accompanied by voices that, through everyday stories and vivid metaphors, evoke the experience of living with the disease.
is renowned for photographing people and communities that have often been overlooked or excluded from public discourse, including the LGBTQ+ community in Los Angeles, of which she herself was a part. At PoMo, visitors can experience both a dedicated gallery presenting key works from her career and the exhibition Mountains Don’t Know Their Names, which is based on a 20-day road trip through the Norwegian winter landscape.
During this journey, Opie photographed Norwegian mountains in the region’s distinctive blue light. The exhibition explores, among other things, how we seek to understand the landscapes around us by assigning them names, stories and meaning.