Narrated by Tilda Swinton, the film recently won the top award at Karlovy Vary (the first British title to do so since Kes).
A creative biography of the Scottish artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham. One of the most important women in British modern art, the painter Wilhelmina Barns-Graham was a highly inspirational figure, whose work was deeply impacted by a pivotal event in her life.
In his essayistic portrait Cousins delves into complex themes of gender, climate change and creativity, while laying bare the artist’s character and vast imagination so pervasively that he creates the impression we are seeing the world through her eyes.
The Garden Cinema View:
A Sudden Glimpse into Deeper Things feature documentary is Mark Cousins' love letter to Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, a significant yet often overlooked British modernist painter.
True to Cousins' unique style, the film takes different angles to investigate her legacy, combining an account of Barns-Graham's climb to the top of a glacier in Switzerland that was pivotal to her art, a lengthy contemplation over one of her photographs as an elderly woman, and a documentation of his acquisition of a Barns-Graham-inspired tattoo. As with all love letters, Cousins' exploration of Barns-Graham's innovative mind is deeply personal and idiosyncratic, weaving together fragments of her life and art in a complex tapestry.
What becomes prominent by the end of this understated documentary, sensitively narrated by Tilda Swinton, is Barns-Graham's range and depth of talent. The power of her incredible, multilayered paintings is undeniable, and the film will no doubt introduce her work to a wider audience.
Mark Cousins is a writer and director. He presented cult BBC film series Moviedrome and is most famous for his 15-hour 2011 documentary The Story of Film: An Odyssey, as well as the 14-hour documentary Women Make Film. His previous film The Story of Film: A New Generation premiered at the Cannes Film Festival.
Mark joined us for a Q&A on 13 October hosted by journalist Wendy Mitchell.