For Halloween, ART SEEN screens a film classic where art and horror meet. A portrait painting becomes the site of horror in this stunning cinematic adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. Artist Film Club presents Marnie Weber’s The Night of Forevermore and Frieze Video: Richard Mosse’s The Impossible Image.

Dorian Gray is a young man so distraught after realizing that his portrait (painted by his friend Basil Hallward) would always stay beautiful while he would age that he manages to magically transmit the wear-and-tear of his deviances onto this work of art. As such, the painting bears the brunt of his indecent actions (murder, drug use, sex), turning ugly and old while Dorian remains exactly the same. And while his decades-long reign of the 19th century’s version of ‘sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll’ leads him down many regretful paths, he delights in each of the painting’s new evil transformations knowing that he’s cheating death. But when a young woman believes in his goodness, his guilt starts to weigh heavy on him and the inevitable downfall comes.

The infamous evil painting in The Picture of Dorian Gray was painted by Ivan Albright, an artist who dove into representing the dirty and discarded aspects of humanity in his captivating images. The painting currently hangs in the permanent collection at the Art Institute of Chicago.

ARTIST FILM CLUB
Marnie Weber’s The Night of Forevermore is a static space housing monsters, demons, witches, human-animal hybrids; all of which come alive with slow, repetitive gestures and sound. It’s a Hieronymous Bosch painting brought to life, a haunting world with creatures familiar and strange, each with their own woe, purpose, and revenge.

FRIEZE VIDEO: Richard Mosse: The Impossible Image (produced in association with Pundersons Gardens). Artist and photographer Richard Mosse reveals the stories behind the making of his latest film, ‘The Enclave’ (2013), in the Democratic Republic of Congo, which will be shown in the Irish Pavilion at this year’s 55th Venice Biennale.

Part of Nitehawk’s Art Seen signature series. In partnership with frieze.