Velázquez and the Cinema

Geoff Andrew discusses his forthcoming talk on the painter.

Dec  8 2006

When I received an email inviting me to deliver a lecture on 'Velázquez and the Cinema' at the National Gallery, my first reaction was to check the sender's address, presuming a pal was playing a joke. Not so; this was the Gallery. I replied, politely venturing that whoever had recommended my name to the Gallery for this talk must be a prankster, since all I really knew about the Spanish painter in relation to the movies was that the writer-director Victor Erice had once written a script about him which, for reasons beyond his control, had not yet been filmed. No joke involved, replied Lee (for that was her name): googling had produced a transcript of an on-stage NFT interview I'd done with Erice, in which I asked if he'd been influenced by the likes of Velázquez and Vermeer. Besides, Lee kindly continued, she knew my book 'Film Directors A-Z' and liked the way it explored cinema in terms of imagery.

Now a little flattery goes a long way with me (it comes along so rarely), so my interest was piqued. Moreover, the invitation to give a talk at the National Gallery, hardly par for the course for yours truly, appealed to my vanity. And while I didn't know much about Velázquez's life, character or methods, as it happens I'm a pretty big fan of his paintings. So the suggestion was intriguing, and a phone conversation ensued in which Lee revealed that a film season programmed to accompany the exhibition would include not only Erice's 'The Spirit of the Beehive' but Eric Rohmer's 'Triple Agent', a film little seen on its release, but which I happen to consider a late masterpiece by one of the world's greatest living filmmakers. I was hooked.

And I like a challenge. To accept this invitation was especially challenging, not only because I'm no expert on the painter (or any painter) but because the title of the talk – 'Velázquez and the Cinema' – was a little unusual. Clearly I wasn't being asked to consider any direct contribution made to film by Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez (1599-1660), since he died more than two centures before the cinema came into being. So precisely what kind of relationship did that titular 'and' signify?

Lee's patient response to that query was basically: That's for you to work out in preparing the lecture, and what you'll discuss on the night. Velázquez's art was to be the starting point for a talk on things cinematic, which is why it was more useful for me to have a specialist knowledge of the latter than of the former. This reduced my anxiety somewhat: it was all about homework. Cinema, for me, is hardly work; it's a passion. I'd follow my instincts; since there's not, as far as I can make out, a mass of writing on the subject in question, I had some leeway in terms of what approach to take.

Finally, the appeal of learning more about the golden age of Velázquez and his art proved irresistible. I already greatly admired the portraits of Philip IV, his family and circle, and found some of the more complex compositions – 'Las Meninas', above all – pleasingly mysterious and utterly fascinating. And I've always enjoyed exploring and thinking about art forms other than cinema, as well as having an opportunity to look at cinema itself from fresh perspectives.

Because that, in a sense, is what the subject of the lecture amounts to. Are there any points of connection and correlation between Velázquez's paintings and the cinema, and if so, what are they? Is there anything in cinema that might help us understand or appreciate his work a little better? Or – and this, given my own standpoint, is more likely to figure in the talk – is there anything in his art that might shed light on the cinema?

Doubting Thomases – and as anyone who's visited the exhibition will know, the persona of Velázquez's disciple is not at all a doubting one – should remember that any director worth her or his salt pays considerable attention to the creation of moving pictures. Composition, colour, costume, lighting and camera movement are as important as dialogue, delivery, performance and plot. Talk to directors, and they often allude to an artist or painting; many seem happier talking about visual arts than literature. After all, they use images to tell stories, create moods, express emotions and ideas. And if therefore they are to some extent working in the same tradition as painters, might not some of them be aware of – even have learned from – 'the painter's painter'?

Using images to tell stories, create moods, express emotions and ideas… Hang on: isn't that what Velázquez was doing, too? So we can already see that, on the most basic level of creative endeavour, there's common ground between his work and that of filmmakers. But if I'm to give an entire lecture on what that common ground looks like, it's fair to say I need to look at it more throughly, in close-up.

So let's say 'Velázquez and the Cinema' will probably be about narrative: how it works in Velázquez, and how it works in the cinema as practised by certain filmmakers. Narrative has characters, tone, structure – some of the things I'll be discussing with relation to those filmmakers. I won't say more here, save that Godard's 'Pierrot le Fou' kicks off with a quotation on Velázquez. I should now confess that there are, in what you've just read, other hints and clues as to which filmmakers I'll be discussing, but if you want to find out more, you'll just have to come along to the talk yourself.

Geoff Andrew will talk on 'Velázquez and the Cinema' at the National Gallery on Wednesday 13 at 6.30pm.

• 
•