THOMAS BEARD: Hi, I’m Thomas Beard. I’m Founder and Director of Light Industry, a venue for Film and Electronic Art in Brooklyn.
Lincoln Kirstein was very much involved in the film culture of his moment. He was interested in avant-garde films. He was interested in James Cagney pictures. He was interested in Eisenstein.
This is a selection from Eisenstein’s unfinished film Que Viva Mexico! Sergei Eisenstein was one of the most important figures in early Soviet Cinema. He went to Mexico to make an epoch-spanning pageant of Mexico’s political history and cultural iconography, ranging from the pre-Columbian era through colonization, and finally revolution. But the picture was ill-fated with the project running over budget after a year of work, funding was pulled and the film was shut down.
JODI HAUPTMAN: Eisenstein was summoned back to the Soviet Union before he could finish his epic project. Passing through New York, he saw Lincoln Kirstein.
THOMAS BEARD: He took Eisenstein on a tour of New York’s gay underground and to speakeasies and so forth. Kirstein was even in the room when Eisenstein viewed, for the very first time, the footage for Que Viva Mexico.
It’s a really tragic film, because its ambitions were so great, it was spanning centuries of time, extraordinary resources were marshaled towards its production, and all we have is this ruin essentially, but it’s a glorious ruin.
JODI HAUPTMAN: Thomas Beard is also the guest curator for our film program related to this exhibition. To hear about it, enter 3344, or, on your phone, MoMA.org/a3344.