Fondation Giacometti

Correspondence from Alberto Giacometti and his parents

Joana Preiss and Olivier Martinaud, 2020 © Christian Lartillot

On the occasion of Mother's Day and Father's Day, Joana Preiss and Olivier Martinaud read extracts from Alberto's correspondence with his mother Annetta between 1927 and 1945 and from his correspondence with his father, the artist Giovanni Giacometti, between 1921 and 1930.

Giacometti left his native Switzerland in the early 1920s to study in Paris and settle there permanently. Away from his parents, he kept up a regular correspondence with them in which the young artist recounts his beginnings, his setbacks, his hopes and his first successes.

Joana Preiss is a theatre and film actress, singer, performer and director. Since 1993, she has been performing Pascal Rambert's shows (De mes propres mains, Félicité, Antoine et Cléopâtre, l'Epopée de Gilgamesh ...) for ten years. In the cinema, she played in the films of Christophe Honoré (Tout contre Leo, Ma mère, Dans Paris...), Olivier Assayas (end of August, beginning of September, Clean, Boarding gate, Noise...), Nobuhiro Suwa (un couple parfait), Pia Marais (Die Unerzogenen) among other directors. She has also collaborated with artists such as Nan Goldin, Ugo Rondinone and Céleste Boursier Mougenot. After studying classical singing and contemporary music, she founded the experimental duo White Tahina with Vincent Epplay in 1998. For several years now, she has been creating unique a capella singing performances, interacting with artworks or musicians in places such as the Kamel Mennour gallery, the Fondation Cartier, the Louis Vuitton cultural space, the Silencio, St Merri church etc. She recently sang in Courage directed by Jeremy Demester at the Pompidou Centre in Metz and then on the national stage at Vandoeuvre-les-Nancy. Her first feature film, Sibérie, was presented in international competition at FID in Marseille in 2011 before being released in theatres in 2012 and on DVD by Capricci in 2013. Her short film Silent Asylum, co-directed with Midi Z, was presented at the Directors' Fortnight in Cannes in 2013, then in numerous festivals and Lands close to Paterson was programmed at the Anthology Film Archives in NYC on an invitation by Marie Losier. She has recently appeared in films by Tonino De Bernardi (Casa Dolce Casa, Hotel de l'univers, Jour et nuit - Delle donne e degli uomini perduti, Resurrezione) Vincent Dieutre (Trilogie de nos vies défaites), Jonathan Millet (La veillée), Julia Ducournau (Grave), then Emilio R. Barrachina (Broken Poet), and at the theatre in The Moon directed by Maisondahlbonnema co-produced by Needcompany on tour in Amsterdam (De Brakke Grond) and Norway (DanseFestival Barents in Hammerfest, Avantgarden in Trondhjem, Fjalerfestivalen in Dale), Maastricht (Ainsi/Theater tan het Vrijthof) and Poznan (Malta festival). She has just performed again with Maisondahlbonnema in Yoga for theatres at the National Theatre in Oslo, for the Meteor festival in Bergen & in Bruges for the december Dance festival. Since 2018 she plays in La Dame aux camélias by Arthur Nauzyciel created at the TNB, on tour until 2021 on all the national stages in France, as well as at the Théâtre de Vidy in Lausanne and at the Grand Théâtre de la ville du Luxembourg.

Born in 1978, Olivier Martinaud graduated from Conservatoire national supérieur d’art dramatique in 2004. In 2008, he directed Imbécile, a musical comedy by Olivier Libaux. He creates the company “garçon pressé ” and directs in German Erich von Stroheimde Christophe Pellet in Berlin in 2009. He creates the literary prices of Thomas Bernhard at La Loge in 2012. With Nils Haarmann, he translates from German three pieces by Nis-Momme Stockmann, including Les Inquiets et les brutes, which he directed at the Lucernaire in 2015. Since 2004, he has recorded over a hundred texts for the programs and fictions of France Culture and France Inter. He also recorded voices for Arte, Center Pompidou and several audio books. He is regularly invited to play, perform or read texts in various literary and artistic events and festivals such as le Marathon des mots and Actoral. At the theater, he is doing scenography of Bruit du monde by Stéphanie Chaillou and Aphrodisia by Christophe Pellet. In cinema, he plays the main role in the next film by Vincent Dietschy, Notre histoire (2019).

Appointment: Sunday 7 June 2020 and Sunday 21 June 2020.
On the Instagram and Facebook accounts of the Fondation Giacometti.

EPISODE #1 - Mother's Day