Friday, February 11, 2011

See and believe , vidio and images




I want to use images and a brief edited video of this project at the beginning when we moved the painting the day before it would have been destroyed. We have continued to document the story as it unfolds over three and a half years now. We have hours of footage that needs editing and a project that needs funding. A valuable and priceless artifact is not cash , the currency that transforms dreams into reality






This gift which was given my family came without a price tag or instructions, or a funding source for its restoration. We have been on a journey of discovery ourselves that has been and adventure and a game changer. This encounter between us promises to change both our fates for the better. One day the painting will be one view restored, in a museum or a museum tour and my family , mother sisters and brothers will be in a position to fund their individual and collective dreams.




This is a match made in heaven and a large part of the money made will go to help restore the Paradise that we collectively share on this planet. It is in disrepair and is broken The Jews have a word for this Tikkun Olam the Restoration of the world.I would like to think that Hundertwasser still lives in a Legestree that he continues to feed with his body of work. He hoped one day that he could become humus in which new green life could spring. With this project we hope to make him smile in the world of the happily dead. He watches us as does the creators eye from the branches of the tree of life. He reminds that we should behave for we are the guests of nature. We must be good stewards in the garden we have been given, sharing equitably with all of life, plant,animal and human.




For some strange reason I can not get the blog to accept the file for the documentary film. You will have to go to the second oldest posting in Feb. of 2010 to view the film clip.

Turning Dreams into Reality

Tony Pemberton a Director and Producer of film recommended I contact Witcraft a script and production company in Vienna, He said that they produced a film of his and recommended them highly. Ursula Wolschlager in particular he gave stellar reviews as a producer. I went to there website and check them out, they seem like perfect partners for our documentary film, Restoring Paradise. see for yourselves at http://www.witcraft.at/en/wolschlager.html

He said that he thought they could not only help develop the script but with the production and the fundraising through a grant from the Austrian Government. Hundertwasser is a national icon and an industry to himself. I have examined all things Hundertwasser, his creative output is phenomenal and extensive. The economic activity derived from this dead artistic icon if calculated is considerable. Like Antonio Gaudi is to Barcelona, he is to Vienna, he is the #3 tourist attraction in the city.

We acquired this painting as a gift from people who did not know its value and would have destroyed it. We saved this lost national treasure of the Austrian peoples would it be so strange to think they might appreciate that considerable effort by one American family that their government might fund the documentary film.

The film well made and well distributed would educate people around the world to whom he remains yet unknown. It would serve many functions beyond increasing the value of our painting Paradise and all his other works. I think he is undervalued and misunderstood by many including thous in his own county. There would be strings attached to the grant of course, His archive in Vienna,, archiv-office@harel.at would supervise and have oversight and the production crew and staff would be Austrians. The money spent would then circulate in the Austrian local economy and the influx of new tourism would bring in extra foreign currency.

We have chosen the best person in the world for the actual conservation work. Ralf Wittig, atelier@ralfwittig.at is a skilled Austrian citizen who knew and worked with Hundertwasser for a decade and works now with his museum and Archive. He issued a five page report on the condition and imortance of this remarkable work. The hair on his arm stood up and he got goosebumps when he first saw this painting. That kind of emotional connection can not be taught at any university. That personal understanding and chemistry uniquely qualifies him and can nor be faked

I talked yesterday with an agent of Sotheby's in NYC who said that they might fund the restoration efforts if we agree to consign the work for auction through them. Harry Rand the Smithsonian Senior curator, and Harvard Art Historian who wrote the book on Hundertwasser told me that he thought we could get a grant for the restoration as well. I told him that we could not believe that someone in ignorance of its value gifted us this painting and we had a hard time believing that others who do not know or care about us would pay for the film and the restoration. He said that we do not understand that those in the art and cultural world especially the foundations live to save what is precious. They do not care about us only about the life of a painting and its future. It not only outlived its makes it will out live us all and the ripples of its effect on the world will continue beyond our lifetimes in ways that will be seen and unseen.

This project is moving slowly in the right directing growing green and gold like moss and mold. Hundertwasser spoke often of this slow unfolding that is not in our control but driven by and unseen force in a universe where our individual and collective thought and action matters.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Restoring Paradise the documentry film.


From the beginning I knew that I had two valuable properties, the painting and the extraordinary story that surrounds it's amazing journey, since its birth in May of 1950 in the old Hunting Lodge of the Contessa Castillion in the wooded outskirts of Paris.




I had the move documented from the old mansion on the Gold Coast of Long Island where we salvaged it. We edited a 2min.30 second video that can be seen in my second posting. I have interviewed four film makers and am planing to produce the film that documents the entertaining and dramatic journey of the painting and the artists that gave it birth.




I will give you details in upcoming posts. The real world and the dentist beckons and I have to go.