Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict – Film Review by Frank L.

Directed by Lisa Immordino Vreeland

Born into the newly-mega-rich Guggenheim clan in New York at the end of the nineteenth century, Peggy Guggenheim from an early age did not fit into the stultifying conventional world of her family. She rebelled and left for Paris. But the Guggenheim genes ran deeply in her veins in that she needed to succeed in her own right. Contemporary art became her milieu. When she entered into it there was not much to enter. When she died in 1981 it was a global phenomenon with her a towering presence within it. Her marvellous single story palazzo in Venice on the Grand Canal is a visible testament to her unique talent as collector and gallerist. In addition her incomparable collection forms a substantial part of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation based in New York.

Although she was by any standards always rich, her unique drive converted her inheritance into something much more valuable than assets with a certain monetary worth. She had a talent to find great men, Marcel Duchamp in particular, have relationships with them and assimilate what they had to say. She was able to look and when she looked, she was able to discern talent. That intuition resulted during a brief period in New York in the mid forties, in her discovery of Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko to name but two. Then in the fifties in Venice she created her own museum of contemporary art works in the palazzo which remains a visual art temple of excellence. She was throughout her adult life at the epicentre of the contemporary art scene.

Vreeland discovered tapes of a series of interviews that Peggy Guggenheim made in 1979/80 with her biographer Jacqueline B. Weld which are probably not in relation to their content all that revelatory. What is remarkable is the matter of fact brusque, nonchalant tone of voice in which Guggenheim speaks. Her voice from these interviews imbues the documentary. The use of these clips add structural strength and context to the various current interviews which Vreeland has conducted with well-known figures from the art world.

This intelligent combination reveals its own insight into the world in which Peggy Guggenheim breathed. Her life had more than its fair share of tragedy, loneliness and an inability to create relationships which withstood the test of time. However her life in the world of contemporary art is a work of art in itself. Vreeland embraces with flair the good, the bad and the ugly of Guggenheim’s life and creates a substantial testament to the diverse talents of Peggy Guggenheim. Contemporary art was fortunate to have such a champion.