Opening at London’s Design Museum on 21 November, Wes Anderson: The Archives is the first major museum exhibition devoted to the celebrated director’s extensive and distinctive cinematic output, featuring over 600 objects that collectively illustrate Anderson’s meticulous craft of filmmaking.
For this landmark retrospective exhibition, the Design Museum has been granted unprecedented access to Wes Anderson’s extensive archives, which the filmmaker has painstakingly built up over three decades. This will be the very first time the majority of objects have been publicly displayed in Britain.
From his first short and feature films in the 1990s up to his most recent productions, the exhibition will chart the evolution of Wes Anderson’s films through original storyboards, polaroids, sketches, famed costumes worn by much-loved characters, stop-motion puppets, miniature models, paintings, props and the director’s handwritten notebooks.
Highlights include the monumental three-metre candy-pink model of the Grand Budapest Hotel, used to capture the building’s façade for the 2014 film; the FENDI fur coat worn by Gwyneth Paltrow as Margot Tenenbaum in The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), and the original stop motion puppets used to depict the fantastical sea creatures in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004).
In sections devoted to Fantastic Mr Fox (2009) and Isle of Dogs (2018), visitors will discover a large selection of original puppets in various scales, including Mr Fox (voiced by George Clooney) wearing his signature corduroy suit and show dog Nutmeg (voiced by Scarlett Johansson) alongside the meticulously built miniature sets.
There will also be a screening of Anderson’s Bottle Rocket short film that went on to be remade as his first feature. Created in 1993 and starring long-time collaborator Owen Wilson, visitors will be able to watch the whole 14-minute cut in the exhibition gallery.
Tim Marlow, Director and CEO of the Design Museum, said: “Wes Anderson has created some of the most visually distinctive and emotionally resonant films of the last two decades — from the melancholic charm of The Royal Tenenbaums to the youthful adventurism of Moonrise Kingdom. He’s an utterly compelling creator of cinematic worlds, whose singular vision and attention to detail are underpinned by an acute understanding of design and craftsmanship, which is why the Design Museum is the perfect location for this landmark retrospective.”
Wes Anderson: The Archives opens at the Design Museum on 21 November. It is a collaboration between la Cinémathèque française in Paris and the Design Museum in London — and with Wes Anderson himself. For further information: designmuseum.org
Photo: Wes Anderson. Copyright Searchlight Pictures / Photo: Charlie Gray
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