Peter Greenaway to visit the IFI

Acclaimed director Peter Greenaway will visit the Irish Film Institute in Dublin this Sunday 13thJuly for a special Q&A session after the 6.10pm screening of his new film Goltzius and the Pelican Company (which is released exclusively at the IFI from 11th July).

In a career which has now lasted over fifty years, Greenaway (The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover, The Draughtsman’s Contract, Drowning by Numbers) has established himself as a filmmaker of exquisite artistry, whose baroque visual style is often contrasted by narratives intrigued with the baser side of human nature. His work has frequently caused controversy, and regularly proves divisive to audiences; his latest film continues in this tradition, with beautifully framed discursions on art, morality, and the function of mass media surrounding episodes of graphic sex and violence. Unashamedly articulate and intellectual, this should prove a fascinating opportunity to hear a singular filmmaker discuss his work. Greenaway’s singular artistic vision has earned him much acclaim, plus a CBE and an honourary award for Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema at the 2014 BAFTAs.

Goltzius and the Pelican Company follows Hendrik Goltzius (Ramsey Nasr, also an author and the Dutch Poet Laureate from Jan 2009 – Jan 2013), the celebrated 16thcentury Dutch printer, painter and engraver, persuades his patron, the liberal-minded Margrave of Alsace, played by F. Murray Abraham (Scarface, Amadeus), to pay for a printing press which will enable him to create an extraordinary deluxe edition of the Old Testament featuring frank illustrations of its erotic tales. In order to make the deal more attractive to the Margrave and his court, Goltzius, along with the male and female members of his Pelican Printing Company, offers to stage live dramatisations of six biblical tales, each of which will demonstrate a different sexual taboo…

Tickets for the screening of Goltzius and the Pelican Company + Peter Greenaway Q+A on Sunday 13th July at 18.10 are available now from the IFI Box Office on 01 679 3477 or at www.ifi.ie. Tickets are also available for the IFI Exclusive release of Goltzius and the Pelican Company (opens July 11th).