Harry Gruyaert: Photographer - Cracking the Frame
"I am attracted by things and things attract me" Belgian photographer Harry Gruyaert (Antwerp, 1941) explains his boundless passion for photography. Gruyaert, a member of the famous Magnum photo agency since 1982, first and foremost sees himself as a street photographer. He is interested in life, but even more so in colour. Many regard him as one of the first photographers who really thought in colour. He captured life everywhere in splendid colours; not only in Belgium, his work also led him to Morocco, India, Ireland, and Egypt. He made famous photo reportages of the 1972 Olympics in Munich and the first Apollo flights; he photographed everything from a (broken) TV screen, then manipulating the colours.
Documentary maker Gerrit Messiaen tells the story of Gruyaert — his strict Catholic upbringing, conflicts with his father, his photography studies and his career, but also how he works, how he seemingly casually turns the ordinary into an extraordinary composition of great beauty.
Director Gerrit Messiaen will be present to answer questions from the audience after the end of the film.
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PLEASE TAKE NOTE: THIS FILM HAS NO ENGLISH SUBTITLES
Director Gerrit MessiaenÂ
After an apprenticeship as screenwriter with the VRT television fiction department, Gerrit Messiaen (Kortrijk, 1964) worked as an assistant for the film director Frans Buyens. In 1996 he realised “A journey with Paul Cox”, a documentary portrait of the Dutch-Australian filmmaker Paul Cox, and his documentary portrait of the Belgian film director Frans Buyens, “Until my last Breath”, won the Henri Storck award for the best Belgian documentary in 1999. Other notable titles include “Hide and seek”, and “Lucien Hervé, photographer despite himself” (2012), selected by more than 30 international film festivals and winner of several awards, among which a Mention Spéciale du Jury at FIFA Montreal 2014 and an award for Best International Film at the Arquiteturas Film Festival Lisboa 2013)
