About the artist:

Elizabeth Lennard is an artist and filmmaker originally from New York, living and working in Paris. Lennard's fascination with the built environment inspired her to direct Tokyo Melody: a Film About Ryuichi Sakamoto (1985), and Casa Bronfman (2009 shown at ADFF), about the Manhattan townhouse designed by Peter Rose. She has also produced a photographic book on Alexander Chemetoff's Bamboo Garden in Paris (1997). Lennard's film projects also train their lens on other artists and writers from throughout modern history. Her video opera Accents in Alsace (2002), and documentary film The Stein Family, The Making of Modern Art (2011) focus on Gertrude Stein, while Edith Wharton: the Sense of Harmony (2014) draws its inspiration from the prolific American novelist. The video performance E-1027 Design For Living Eileen Gray & Jean Badovici (2015) has been presented internationally and was supported by the Graham Foundation. Born in New York City currently lives and works in Paris. With the development of color photography the rendering of photographic hand coloring tell into near disuse. Though many black and white photographers worked temporarily with color applied by hand, this technique existed as a limited area in photographic art. In recent months we have seen a decided trend toward updated use of this simple, yet unlimited technique. From the moment photography was first available, the public, familiar with painted miniatures, regretted that the new invention did not have color. Although they were captivated by its incredible detail and rich tonality this was not enough. The daguerrotype still needed color to give it the sense of reality it lacked, and so the studio photographer in order to please his customers developed the skill of painting over his images. Not unlike the Victorians, Elizabeth Lennard paints photographs. However, her intent is not to invest her pictures with reality. Quite the contrary. If anything her imagery communicates a mysterious unreality. Elizabeth Lennard, 25, began taking photographs of neighborhood kids when she was 16. In her last semester of high school she took a photography class, though she had no intentions at that time of becoming a photographer. Later, while in art school, Elizabeth studied drawing and lithography, and worked with watercolors and pastels. She began experimenting with hand coloring during her first year in art school, and since then has developed an impressive technique. Why hand color and not color film? "There are many reasons," she says. I like the texture of oil paint on a print. I don't like the object that a color photograph is. Paint gives a more organic, living substance to the hand colored photograph. And I love color." Lennard uses the structural manifestations of the American urban and suburban landscape and transmutes them into something unsettling but beautiful. Ms. Lennard uses color to reinvent reality and create a magical world of her own making. Sensuous pinks, greens, and yellows in ice cream tints are Lennard's magic. Her rearrangement of the familiar is not through the conventional juxtaposition of surprising form, but through an alchemy of color that forces us to reexamine our surroundings and delight in them. Lennard's is the yellow brick road, to a world of "what ifs," that enables us briefly 10 repair our tired sensibilities and once more see with joy and surprise of a child. Sometimes it is easier for a foreigner to observe cultural phenomena in a detached way. And so the French appreciate Lennard's work to the extent that they have shown her in their most prestigious showplace, The Centre Nationale d' Art Moderne, Georges Pompidou, in Paris. SOLO EXHIBITIONS – altered photography (a selection) 2012 Berkeley Girls, Gallery Pixi, Marie Victoire Poliakoff Gallery Paris June - July 2011 Jelly Molds, Stairways and a few other things, Gallery Pixi, February-March Portugal ’75, Pente10 Gallery, Lisbon, Portugal 2008 India, Dinter Fine Art, New York City, January-February Paris-New York, le Coin des Arts, July- August, Paris 2007 Berkeley Girls, Frank Pictures Gallery, Bergamot Station, Los Angeles Berkeley Girls, video 3 min., Dinter Fine Art, Project room, New York City, 2005-6 Past Present, Marie Victoire Poliakoff Pixi Gallery, Paris 2004 India Marie Victoire Poliakoff Pixi Gallery, Paris 2002 Objects Lie… FNAC Montparnasse, Mois de la Photo, Paris Objects lie on a table & Botanical Gardens Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Brussels 2000 Botanical Gardens & Objects Lie On a Table, Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Paris Signs Marie Victoire Poliakoff-Pixi Gallery, November, Paris 1999 Botanical Gardens Marie Victoire Poliakoff-Pixi Gallery, April/May, Paris 1996 A list: Homage to Gertrude Stein and the French Landscape French Cultural Services, N.Y. Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Paris 1995 New York, New York , M. 20 Gallery, Hamburg 1992 Van Melle Gallery, Paris 1989 Viviane Esders Gallery, Paris 1986 Thackerey & Robertson Gallery, San Francisco 1981 Kunsthalle, Ingolstadt 1980 Bernd Lange-Irschl Gallery, Munich 1979 Painted New York, Centre Georges Pompidou, Museum of Modern Art, Paris Thackerey & Robertson Gallery, San Francisco CROSS-DISCIPLINARY PERFORMANCES AND VIDEO OBJECTS 2012 Battle Scenes of Louis François Lejeune, 15 min, Chateau de Versailles, Mirage Illimité in the exhibition Napoleon’s Wars, Louis François Lejeune General & Painter, Link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moo8xBQD0R4 2012 & 2006 Short Sentences by Gertrude Stein, Grand Palais, Paris, 01-15-12 Adaptation: Elizabeth Lennard & Danielle Mémoire, directed by Elizabeth Lennard. also at the Halles de Schaerbeek, Brussels, 2004 2009 Pour faire une cordelière, video performance, collaboration with Danielle Mémoire, “le Nouveau Festival”, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, Nov. 21; Institut Franco-Portugais, Lisbon, 25 October, 2010 2006 Poetry and Painting, happening in the Girodet Exhibition, Louvre Museum, Paris, adaptation and creation by Elizabeth Lennard, texts by Chateaubriand, Klossowski, Racine ; with Geoffrey Carey, Anne Priol & Christophe Ferveur, October 7 The Revolt of Cairo, video room, with Guy Cogeval, commissioned by the Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal for the Girodet Exhibition 2002 Accents in Alsace- video opera & For the Country Entirely, by Gertrude Stein, music by Marc Olivier Dupin. Adapted by Elizabeth Lennard & Danielle Mémoire, directed by Elizabeth Lennard, Musica Festival, Strasbourg Oct. 3, 2002, MC93 Bobigny, Oct. 8-23 2001 15 Days in the American Wilderness, multimedia performance from Alexis de Tocqueville with Geoffrey Carey, (English version) Museum of American Art at Giverny, Terra Foundation, July 15 Maison Française, Columbia University, New York City, - September 13 Co- Sponsored by the Florence Gould Foundation 2000 For the Country Entirely, Bonne Année, Ladies Voices, Curtain Raiser, multimedia performance from Gertrude Stein in French and English with Geoffrey Carey, Coralie Seyrig & Dominic Gould, adapted by Elizabeth Lennard & Danielle Mémoire, directed by Elizabeth Lennard, Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Paris; Museum of American Art, Giverny Terra Foundation. 1998 Counting her dresses, He Said It, Objects Lie On A Table, Every Afternoon, If I told him, a completed portrait of Picasso, by Gertrude Stein, multimedia performance with Geoffrey Carey & Coralie Seyrig, adaptation by Elizabeth Lennard & Danielle Mémoire, directed by Elizabeth Lennard, Gallery Filles du Calvaire 1996 A List by Gertrude Stein, multimedia performance by Elizabeth Lennard with Laura Benson, Dominic Gould, Coralie Seyrig, Geoffrey Carey, at the Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Paris 1995 Plis d'Excellence, Post Office Museum, Paris, 5 part-video, on James Lee Byars, Estelle Cabannes, Michel Butor, Dominique Briffaut & Pisani/Charlemagne, Design: Denis Colomb Filmography - (director- a selection) 2011 The Stein Family, the making of Modern Art, 54 min, produced by Artline Films, broadcast on Arte, Nov.12, shown at the Grand Palais Oct –Jan, ARTFIFA Montreal 2009 Wittgenstein’s Colours, 14 min, with Danielle Mémoire and Louise Corrado 2009 Casa Bronfman, 38 min., co-directed by Ermanno Corrado, ARTFIFA Montréal, 2010 ADFF Tribeca Cinemas, New York, 2010 2004 Serge Poliakoff at close range, 52 minutes, Artline Films, broadcast on France 5, shown at ARTFIFA Montréal, Maillol Museum, Paris, Kunsthalle der hypokulturstiftung, Munich 1998 Edith Wharton, the Sense of Harmony, 52 min., "un siècle d'écrivains" France 3, Maison Française, Columbia University, New York, France Amériques, Paris, 1985 Tokyo Melody, a film about Ryuichi Sakamoto, 16mm color, 62 min. Produced by the National Audiovisual Institute and Yoroshita Music Inc. Shown at the following film festivals: Rotterdam, London, New Directors /New Films MOMA New York, Edinburgh, Locarno, Tokyo, Sidney ... Broadcast on FRANCE 3, NHK 1981 Meeting with Gisele Freund, 16mm, 14mn. Also produced by Elizabeth Lennard & the Centre Pompidou; broadcast on Canal Planète 1979 Mardi Gras, 16mm 9 minutes, based on a poem by Blaise Cendrars GROUP EXHIBITIONS (a selection) 2011 Arkhaiologia, Centre PasquArt, Sept. – Nov., Biel/Bienne, Switzerland Summer Salt, curated by Ingrid Dinter, The Proposition Gallery, July 6 – August 7, N.Y. 2010 Versailles photographed 1850-2010, Château de Versailles, January 26- April 25 Consider the Oyster, curated by Ingrid Dinter, James Graham and Sons, N.Y. 2008-9 How to Cook a Wolf, Dinter Fine Art, New York City 2008 Des Jeunes gens modernes, Galerie du Jour Agnes B . Paris, Hong Kong Transparencies, l’Imagerie, Lannion 2007Common Objects, Dinter Fine Art, New York City 2006 Art Paris, Marie Victoire Poliakoff-Pixi Gallery, October, Grand Palais, Paris 2005 La Légèreté, Pixi Gallery, Paris 2003 Paris Photo, Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Atelier Franck Bordas 2001 Prime Choice, Marie Victoire Poliakoff- Pixi Gallery, October, Paris 2000 Art Paris, Marie Victoire Poliakoff-Pixi Gallery, October, Carrousel du Louvre, Paris Paris Photo, Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Carrousel du Louvre, Paris « Histoires naturelles », Museum of Natural History, Nov-Jan, Paris Le Dessin Autrement, l’imagerie, Lannion, April-May 1999 FIAC, Filles du Calvaire Gallery, September, Paris Paris Photo, Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Carrousel du Louvre, Paris Art Brussels, Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Art Paris, Gallery Pixi, September 1998 100th Anniversary of New York City, New York Public Library, New York Recycling Art History, Pittsburg Center for the Arts, Pittsburg ARCO 98, Madrid, Art Brussels, Gallery les Filles du Calvaire 1997 Paris Photo, Filles du Calvaire Gallery, Carrousel du Louvre, Paris 1996 Photographers and the snap cardigan Agnes b, Centre Georges Pompidou 1994 La Ville, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris 1992 Découvertes 92, Gallery Van Melle, Grand Palais, Paris La Photographie en Miettes II, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris 1985 Monuments en quête d’auteur, CNMH, Hôtel de Sully, Paris 1984Images et Imaginaires d'Architecture, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris Subject, Object or Pretext? DRAC Aquitaine 1981Hand Painted Photographs, De Sasset Museum, Santa Clara, California The Self-Portrait, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris 1978 Thousand Eyes, Moderna Museet, Stockholm Other - 2010 l’affiche N°53, poetry poster in collaboration with Danielle Mémoire, published by Editions Bleu du Ciel and limited edition print of the same