How to Draw a Bunny: A Ray Johnson Portrait, is a 2002 American documentary film about the Detroit-born pop, collage and performance artist Ray Johnson.[2]
| How to Draw a Bunny | |
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| Directed by | John W. Walter |
| Produced by |
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| Starring |
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| Cinematography |
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| Edited by | John W. Walter |
| Music by | Max Roach |
Production companies | |
| Distributed by | Artisan Entertainment |
Release date |
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Running time | 90 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $4,148[1] |
Summary
editFilmmakers John Walter and Andrew L. Moore delve into the mysterious life and death of Johnson, an artist whose “world was made up of amazing coincidences, serendipities and karmic gags,” according to Michael Kimmelman of The New York Times.[3] After Johnson's suicide, Moore and Walter conducted interviews with artists including Christo, Chuck Close, Roy Lichtenstein, Judith Malina, and James Rosenquist. In addition, they gathered photographs, works of art, and home movies, which were edited into a fast-paced narrative exploring the artist's life.[4][5][6]
Reception
editThe filmmakers “couldn’t have chosen a more elusive subject for a movie; their success in evoking Johnson, and in documenting his world, is a triumph of sympathy over psychology, memory over historicism,” wrote Stuart Klawans for The Nation.[7]
The film has a score of 78 on Metacritic.[8]
Accolades
editThe film premiered at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Special Jury Prize.[9] The film also won the Grand Prix du Public 2002 at the Rencontres Internationales de Cinema in Paris and was nominated for a 2003 Independent Spirit Award and listed in New York Magazine’s “Top Ten of 2004.”[10]
References
edit- ^ The Numbers.com
- ^ 15 Documentaries That Inside an Artist's Head - The New York Times
- ^ Kimmelman, Michael (October 6, 2002). "A Collage in Which Life=Death=Art". The New York Times. Retrieved 31 August 2015.
- ^ "How to Draw a Bunny". Variety. 2002-02-09. Archived from the original on 2021-06-06.
- ^ Chicago Reader
- ^ The Storytellers’ Stories: The Best Documentaries About Artists|Artland Magazine
- ^ Klawans, Stuart (October 28, 2002). "License to Kill". The Nation. Retrieved 31 August 2015.
- ^ Metacritic
- ^ FilmAffinity
- ^ "How to Draw a Bunny". The Estate of Ray Johnson. Retrieved 31 August 2015.