Brief Encounters

  • March 5, 2016 / 19:00
  • March 11, 2016 / 18:00

Director: Kira Muratova
Cast: Vladimir Vysotskii, Kira Muratova, Nina Ruslanova, Elena Bazilskaya, Aleksei Glazyrin
Soviet Union, 1968, 96’, black & white
Russian with Turkish subtitles

For her astonishing debut feature, Kira Muratova cast herself as Valentina, the head of a regional housing office in a backwater Soviet-era town. For some time, Valentina has been carrying on an affair with Maxim, a free-spirited geologist who occasionally passes through town on prospecting missions. She hires a country girl, Nadya, as a housemaid, not knowing she had a relationship with Maxim during one trip. The lives, memories, and desires of these characters are woven together through Muratova's subtle and intricate montage, showing through flashbacks each woman's idealization of Maxim - played by Vladimir Vysotsky, a performer of anthemic underground songs hailed then as the "Russian Bob Dylan." Banned and shelved til glasnost, Brief Encounters rankled the censors with its freewheeling morals and tough look at everyday Soviet life. Muratova unflinchingly records the dismal housing conditions, lack of public facilities, and growing desperation of the young workers who have abandoned the countryside to try their luck in the city.

Brief Encounters

Brief Encounters

Passions

Passions

The Asthenic Syndrome

The Asthenic Syndrome

The Tuner

The Tuner

Three Stories

Three Stories

Chekhov's Motifs

Chekhov's Motifs

From two portraits of children…

From two portraits of children…

The Suna and İnan Kıraç Foundation’s Orientalist Painting Collection includes two children’s portraits that are often featured in exhibitions on the second floor of the Pera Museum. These portraits both date back to the early 20th century, and were made four years apart. One depicts Prince Abdürrahim Efendi, son of Sultan Abdulhamid II, while the figure portrayed on the other is Nazlı, the daughter of Osman Hamdi Bey.

Journey to the East

Journey to the East

Pera Museum presents an exhibition of French artist Félix Ziem, one of the most original landscape painters of the 19th century. This week we are sharing Ziem’s work inspired by Istanbul and “the East”! 

Reminiscences of Motifs

Reminiscences of Motifs

As artisanship became a part of artistic practices with the blurring of art and craft, the use of traditional motifs has also flourished. In this context, how are these motifs currently structured or designed beyond their traditional connotations?