Garage launches an open-air cinema on Garage Square

This summer Garage Screen moves beyond the Museum building to a new, open-air cinema on Garage Square in Gorky Park.

Since its launch in 2012, Garage Screen has brought viewers a wide range of Russian and international movies, documentaries, and experimental films. On May 12, 2017, Garage launches a new, open-air cinema designed by Milan-based architects GRACE (Ekaterina Golovatyuk and Giacomo Cantoni) on Garage Square, in front of the entrance to the Museum. This year’s open-air screening program will run from May 12 to September 17.

Following last year’s sell-out series of screenings on Garage Rooftop it was clear that the new cinema needed to be larger: it has 350 seats. It also boasts a 15.2 x 6.2 m screen, cutting-edge digital 4K video equipment, and Christie Vive Audio immersive sound. The cinema architecture echoes that of Garage, with mirrored surfaces and a lightweight roof in summer sunset colors.

Garage Screen programs in 2017—including Films about Cinema, New Views, Visual Matter, and Between the Personal and the Political — explore contemporary art and culture in all its diversity, providing insight into the lives of well-known and emerging artists, musicians, and architects and into how art works and exhibitions are made. Garage is also working with leading Russian film festivals and Moscow cinemas such as Documentary Film Center, and Beat Film Festival to produce joint programs.

The new cinema will open May 18 with Sky Ladder: The Art of Cai Guo-Qiang (2016), a film examining the work of Chinese contemporary artist Cai Guo-Qiang, who is famous for his gunpowder drawings. Throughout May, viewers will have the chance to see recent documentaries and experimental movies, including Homo Sapiens (2016) by Nikolaus Geyrhalter—which features stunning images of abandoned buildings—and A Music Lesson (2014) by Marie-Ange Gorbanevsky, which looks into the world of Russian music education for children. On May 20 and 21, the Museum will host the second Garage Art Book Fair, which will be accompanied by a series of special screenings, including. Nancy Kates’ Regarding Susan Sontag (2014), an intimate investigation into the life of one of the most influential and provocative thinkers of the twentieth century by her colleagues and friends, and The Seasons in Quincy: Four Portraits of John Berger, a portrait of critic, artist, and poet John Berger (1926–2017) created by the film’s co-director and actress Tilda Swinton, who was Berger’s close friend. The launch of the Russian translation of Simon Critchley’s book On Bowie will be marked by a retrospective of five films featuring the iconic singer and actor David Bowie (1947–2016) and the documentary David Bowie: The Last Five Years (2013) by Francis Whately.

Films by Artists is a Garage Screen project with Beat Film Festival featuring four films at the boundary of cinema and video art made by artists, anthropologists, and performance artists. The program launches on May 26 with the Russian premiere of Manifesto (2015) by German artist Julian Rosefeldt. In this film version of his multi-channel video installation, actress Cate Blanchett performs the most important manifestos of the twentieth century as a series of monologues in which she transforms into thirteen different people, including a school teacher, a tramp, a choreographer, and a news anchor. The film is distributed by A-One Films and Russian World Vision, and will be released in Russia on June 8.

Garage Screen programs New Views and Visual Matter explore the experimental language of cinema. New Views presents the latest videos by contemporary artists working in Russia, while Visual Matter focuses on the poetics of the image, showcasing both recent and older films. Between the Personal and the Political, scheduled for August, will focus on documentaries from the past decade, personal stories, historical and political research, and archive material.

All Garage Screen films are shown in the original language with Russian subtitles. Films are accessible to deaf and hard of hearing visitors. The cinema is wheelchair accessible.