Chantal Akerman – A Lasting Heritage

MARCH – JULY 2024

CHANTAL AKERMAN: TRAVELLING AT BOZAR
March 14 – July 21

This exhibition traces the atypical trajectory of Belgian filmmaker, writer, and artist Chantal Akerman (Brussels 1950 – Paris 2015). From the very beginning in Brussels to the Mexican desert, from her very first films to her last installations in 2015. This is the first major exhibition on the Brussels-based artist, featuring unique and never-before-seen images, production, and working documents from her archive. Follow all the stages of her career through the years and places Akerman has traversed and filmed. She went there to work with media as diverse as film, television, text, and installation. Chantal Akerman was an inspiration to an entire generation. She remains a role model for a lot of directors and artists today. Expect a journey full of images and archives – from the burlesque to the tragic, from the intimacy of a bedroom to the desert.
BOZAR Brussels

Curator : Laurence Rassel

Screening of Jeanne Dielman at BOZAR
March 13

To celebrate the opening of Bozar’s exhibition Chantal Akerman: Travelling, the Brussels’ institution is organising a screening of the restored version of Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles at Cinema RITCS.
Bozar Brussels

D’Est en Musique at Bozar
March 14

Together with Akerman, cellist and lifelong partner Sonia Wieder-Atherton created a haunting cinematic concert in which D’Est resonates poetically with music by Schnittke, Martinů, Chopin and other composers from Russia and Eastern Europe. Accompanied by pianist Sarah Rothenberg, Wieder-Atherton revives this concert playing on the images of D’Est, coming up next in collaboration with Klara Festival at Bozar for the opening of its exhibition Chantal Akerman: Travelling.
Klara Festival

RETROSPECTIVE AND CARTE BLANCHE AT CINEMATEK
March 15 – July 21

Closely linked to this large exhibition, CINEMATEK is hosting a 5-month series of screenings showcasing the complete oeuvre of Chantal Akerman. This retrospective is accompanied by a carte blanche, featuring films that held significance for Akerman, curated with the assistance of some of her loved ones and colleagues. Many talks and introductions will punctuate this comprehensive programme, with the presence of guests like Laura Mulvey (film theorist), Boris Lehman (filmmaker), Patricia Canino (editor of Jeanne Dielman), Caroline Champetier (director of photography), Anouk De Clercq (artist), and Sharon Lokhart (photographer and filmmaker). They will participate in discussions, presentations, and conferences to contextualize Akerman’s films.
CINEMATEK

COLLECTION OF TEXTS ON SABZIAN
March 13

The online film magazine Sabzian is launching on March 13 a page containing a curated collection of texts by critics and scholars dedicated to Akerman’s filmography.
Sabzian

RELEASE OF THREE DOCUMENTARIES ON AVILA
March 19

Three of Chantal Akerman’s documentaries, D’EST, SUD and DE L’AUTRE CÔTÉ will be added to Avila’s collection, available to stream for the public.
AVILA – Akerman collection

Golden Eighties: Exhibition and Release

GOLDEN EIGHTIES RESTORED
April 11 – June 23

Chantal Akerman’s beloved musical Golden Eighties (1986) has just undergone a restoration through the collaborative efforts of CINEMATEK and L’Immagine Ritrovata, under the supervision of her close collaborator Luc Benhamou, the film’s camera operator. In light of this new realization, Cinema Palace presents Exhibition Golden Eighties: On the set with Chantal Akerman, a free exhibition showcasing a collection of unpublished of set photographs (Jean Ber), running from April 12 to June 23. This exhibition is also an opportunity for Palace to take a closer look at a lesser-known facet of Chantal Akerman’s work: joyful, colorful, infatuated with popular culture.

Accompanying the exhibition, the restored film is set to premiere at Cinema Palace on April 11. It will be theatrically released and will tour around Belgium as part of the programmes of Avila! Presents, Cinea’s Classics Restored and Film Fest Gent On Tour. Click on the link below to retrieve all the screening dates!

Screenings agenda

Previously

SEPTEMBER 9 – NOVEMBER 5
yours at Contour Biennial of Moving Images

The Contour Biennial, which opens in Mechelen on September 9, has taken up the baton by featuring Chantal Akerman in the collective film yours, an echo of her work and especially News from Home (1976) commissioned by the biennial’s curators and produced by artists Eva Giolo, Rebecca Jane Arthur, Katja Mater, Sirah Foighel Brutmann and Eitan Efrat, Maaike Neuville). The film is screening at the Kunscentrum nona in Mechelen from Wednesday to Sunday until November 5. 

In collaboration with Contour, the Cinema Lumiere of Mechelen will also hold a screening of News from Home on October 28.

CONTOUR – KUNSTCENTRUM NONA

NEWS FROM HOME – CINEMA LUMIERE (MECHELEN)

SEPTEMBER 28
Avant-première of the restored version of Les Rendez-vous d’Anna (1978)

The Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles, the Fondation Chantal Akerman and CINEMATEK are delighted to present the new restoration by CINEMATEK of Les Rendez-vous d’Anna (1978). On Thursday September 28 the film premiered at Palace in the presence of Aurore Clément and Sylviane Akerman.

The film is screening in Brussels and relaesed by Cinea in numerous cinemas in Flanders since October 4. Find out all the details about the re-release below.

CINEMA PALACE

SEPTEMBER 29 – 12H30
Inauguration of the Allée Chantal Akerman and of mural dedicated to the director

The Echevinat de la Culture of the City of Brussels wished to see in their 2023 street art parcours an echo of the Echevinat de l’Urbanisme’s decision to rename the central berm of the Quai du Commerce, Allée Chantal Akerman.

In collaboration with the All about thinks collective, the city invited the Spanish film-loving artist Alba Fabre Sacristan to draw inspiration from the work of Chantal Akerman. She used a scene from the legendary film Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Brussels.

The public joined on September 29 around the corner of Quai aux Barques and Rue Saint-André for the inaugurations of the mural and the newly named Allée Chantal Akerman. 

PARCOURS STREET ART BRUSSELS

ALLÉE CHANTAL AKERMAN

FROM OCTOBER 4
Les Rendez-vous d’Anna (1978) in Belgian cinemas

National release of the restored copy of Les Rendez-vous d’Anna. As of October 4, catch a screening at Cinema Palace (Brussels), Sphinx Cinema (Ghent), Cinema Lumière (Antwerp), Kunstcentrum Buda (Kortrijk), Cinema Storck (Ostende) and Cinema Lumière (Bruges).

Soon also available on Avila

OCTOBER 27 – MARCH 10
Her Voice – Echoes of Chantal Akerman at FOMU Antwerp

The group exhibition Her Voice – Echoes of Chantal Akerman presents photographic and video works by seven contemporary artists inspired by the work of Belgian filmmaker Chantal Akerman. Manon de Boer, Moyra Davey, Gabby Laurent, Frida Orupabo, Joanna Piotrowska, Collier Schorr and Carmen Winant explore what it means today to be a woman, artist, mother, daughter and lover.

“I haven’t tried to find a compromise between myself and others, I have thought that the more particular I am, the more I address the general.”
– Chantal Akerman

FOMU ANTWERP

NOVEMBER 5 – MARCH 10
Complementary screenings at Lumières Antwerp for the exhibtion Her Voice

News From Home (1978), Je, tu, il, elle (1974) and Jeanne Dielman, 21, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975) will screen over the coming months at Cinéma Lumières of Antwerp to accompany the exhibtion Her Voice – Echoes of Chantal Akerman. An occasion to (re)discover her staple films from the 1970s through the lense of the impact they still have on contemporary artists.

LUMIERES ANTWERP