“Matisse & Picasso,” a national Emmy nominated HDTV special produced by KERA and broadcast on PBS stations nationwide, offers compelling portraits of two of the 20th century’s greatest artists and the gentle rivalry that spurred each man to higher levels of achievement.
Meet the Production Team
Meet the Production Team
Ginny Martin, Co-Producer/Director, Photographer
Martin is an award-winning producer, director, videographer and editor. In 1999, she co-produced KERA’s “Ready for Life,” a one-hour special focusing on six Texas families and their struggle to provide an emotionally healthy foundation for their children. In 2000, she directed photography for KERA’s documentary, “Finding Our Voice: The Dallas Gay & Lesbian Community.” In 1999, Martin earned a national Emmy as co-producer, director and editor of KERA’s four-part series for PBS, “The U.S.-Mexican War (1846-1848).”
Among Martin’s numerous national credits are “After Goodbye: An AIDS Story,” “Wildflowers with Helen Hayes” and “Spirits of the Canyon: Ancient Art Along the Pecos River.” Other PBS credits include director credits for “Great Performances” and “American Playhouse” specials as well as “Facing Evil with Bill Moyers.”
Martin’s television work has earned a wide range of awards, including multiple national and regional Emmy awards, a Gold Medal in the New York Festivals, a National Educational Film & Video Festival Award and the 1992 Women in Film/Dallas Achievement Award.
Rob Tranchin, Co-Producer/Director, Writer
Tranchin is a senior producer, writer and director of documentaries and outreach specials for KERA. His national productions for PBS include “Wildcatter” (for “The American Experience”), “Who Cares about Kids?” with poet and author Maya Angelou, “For a Deaf Son,” and “Peacemaker.” Most recently, Tranchin co-produced KERA’s one-hour special, “Ready for Life.” Tranchin also wrote and co-produced KERA’s national Emmy Award-winning four-part PBS series “The U.S.-Mexican War (1846-1848).”
Awards for his work include a national and regional Emmy awards; Gold and Silver Awards from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting; Gold and Silver Apple Awards from the National Educational Television Association; the John R. Haney Award from the Southern Educational Communications Association; an Iris Award from the National Association of Television Program Executives; Griot and Maat Awards from the National Association of Black Journalists; and numerous awards from film and video festivals nationally.
Joe Bellotti, Co-Producer
Bellotti is a 20-year veteran of the film, television and video industry, with producer credits on several national public television productions, including KERA’s “Dallas Symphony Orchestra: Music of Bernstein, Barber and Beethoven.” For 14 years, Bellotti produced and managed projects for HBO, CBS, NBC, Universal Television, Sony/Tri-star and Viacom. He is a member of the Director’s Guild of America.
Rick Thompson, Executive Producer
Thompson is an award-winning producer with 20 years of production experience. Most recently, Thompson was executive producer of KERA’s one-hour special, “Ready for Life,” and KERA’s documentary, “Finding Our Voice: The Dallas Gay & Lesbian Community.” His national public television credits also include KERA’s cooking series, “New Tastes From Texas With Chef Stephan Pyles,” (executive producer), and KERA’s “Child Safety: It’s No Accident” (executive producer).
Thompson’s award-winning documentary credits include “The Way to Wright’s House,” a historical look at the career of former House Speaker Jim Wright and the political legends who inspired him to follow in the footsteps of mentor and fellow Texan Sam Rayburn; “The Sirens Never Stopped,” a chilling recounting of the initial life-saving measures in the first, critical hours after the destructive Mexico City earthquakes; and “Oklahoma Shame,” an in-depth, investigative series that uncovered abuses at state-run juvenile facilities. Thompson has also received a Headliners Award and seven Best Newscast honors presented by the Associated Press, United Press International, and the Dallas Press Club.
Sylvia Komatsu, Executive in Charge
As Senior Vice President, Television Production for KERA, Komatsu is responsible for all KERA local and national television productions. She has extensive credits as producer, writer, executive producer and program executive for public television programs. She conceived and developed the national Emmy Award-winning documentary, “The U.S.-Mexican War (1846-1848),” a four-hour bi-national series that premiered on PBS and in Mexico in 1998.
Other national PBS production credits as executive in charge include: “Peacemaker,” a documentary featuring the making of a television drama by a group of young people from West Dallas, one of the poorest areas of the country, in response to the violence in their community; “Water,” an examination of people’s precarious reliance on the world’s fragile water resources; “After Goodbye: An AIDS Story,” a candid portrayal of love, loss and courage that looked at the impact of AIDS on Dallas’ internationally renowned Turtle Creek Chorale; and “For A Deaf Son,” a first-person account by producer Rob Tranchin tracing his family’s journey through a maze of life-changing decisions that must be made when a deaf child is born to hearing parents.
Komatsu’s television work has earned numerous awards from a wide range of presenters including the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (two national Emmy Awards), the American Film and Video Festival, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the National Educational Media Network, the International Film and Television Festival of New York, the U.S. International Film and Video Festival, the National Association of Television Program Executives, Women in Communications, the Environmental Media Association and the National Educational Telecommunications Association.
Production Facts
Program: “Matisse & Picasso”
Parts/Length: 1/30 minutes
Air Dates/Time: Premiered on PBS September 20, 2000 at 10 p.m. Eastern
Description: “Matisse & Picasso” offers a compelling portrait of two giants of 20th century art who inspired one another with a timeless dialogue that even death could not silence. This national Emmy nominated documentary was inspired by the Fort Worth (Texas) Kimbell Art Museum’s exclusive exhibition, “Matisse & Picasso: A Gentle Rivalry,” and brings together for the first time several key, visually compelling examples of the ongoing “game of chess” between the two artists. KERA’s first high-definition television (HDTV) documentary combines spectacular photography of rarely seen paintings and sculpture with archival photographs and film footage of these two masters at work.
Narrator: Salome Jens, veteran stage and screen actress.
Voice talent: Television and screen actress Genevieve Bujold is the voice of Francoise Gilot. Television actor Robert Clary is the voice of Henri Matisse. Miguel Ferrer, television and screen actor and voice performer, is the voice of Pablo Picasso.
Rights/releases: 6 releases/4 years. Public television broadcasts, including noncommercial cable and one-year school record rights
Producer: “Matisse & Picasso” is a production of KERA-Dallas/Fort Worth/Denton in association with the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas.
Production credits: Co-Produced and Directed by Ginny Martin and Rob Tranchin; Written by Rob Tranchin; Photographed and Edited by Ginny Martin; Co-Producer: Joe Bellotti; Executive Producer: Rick Thompson; Executive in Charge: Sylvia Komatsu
Funding: “Matisse & Picasso” is funded in part by a grant from The Forrest C. Lattner Foundation, and by PBS.
Voice Talents
“Matisse & Picasso,” a 30-minute high definition documentary airing nationwide on PBS, offers a compelling portrait of two giants of 20th century art told through the voices of several distinguished television and screen actors.
Salome Jens, narrator of “Matisse & Picasso,” is a well-known stage actress and veteran of television and movies. Her stage credits include lead roles in Shakespeare’s “Winter Tale” and “Anthony and Cleopatra” and her many starring roles on TV include “LA Law,” “Falcon Crest” and “Melrose Place.” Jens previously narrated PBS’s four-hour documentary on World War I, “The Great War.”
Providing the voice for Francoise Gilot is Genevieve Bujold, who has appeared in more than 40 films since 1963. She is perhaps best known for her role as Anne Boleyn in the 1969 film, “Anne of a Thousand Days.” Recent work includes critically-acclaimed performances in the independent film, “The House of Yes” (1997) and the 1999 major film “Eye of the Beholder.”
Singer/actor Robert Clary is the voice of Henri Matisse. Clary carved a place for himself on Broadway when he landed a role in the musical “New Faces of 1952,” where his show-stopping performances made him a household name. Making the transition to film and television, he appeared in “A New Kind of Love” with Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward and on TV he played Corporal Louis LeBeau for the hit series “Hogan’s Heroes.” A Holocaust survivor, Clary also appeared on the 1982 NBC television movie about holocaust survivors, “Remembrance of Love.”
Miguel Ferrer, a distinguished television and screen actor and voice performer, is the voice of Pablo Picasso. Audiences are familiar with Ferrerís performances as a ruthless executive in the 1986 hit “Robocop,” and as an FBI pathologist from TV’s legendary “Twin Peaks.” He provided the voice of Shan Yu in the 1998 animated feature “Mulan” and appeared in the 1997 television series, “Lateline.”
News Release
August 14, 2000
Contact: Steve Anderson (214) 740-9283
PBS PREMIERE OF KERA’S ‘MATISSE & PICASSO’ AIRS SEPT. 20
The paintings of Henri Matisse have been called masterpieces of 20th century art. So too, those of Pablo Picasso – powerful, inventive, uncompromising. Placed together, side by side, these works tell a remarkable tale of two rivals who found inspiration in each other. Over nearly half a century, the two men challenged each other with paintings and sculptures that have left an indelible impression in the annals of contemporary art.
“Matisse & Picasso,” airing on PBS on Wednesday, September 20, 2000 at 10:00 p.m. Eastern (check local listings), offers compelling portraits of two of the 20th century’s greatest artists and the gentle rivalry that spurred each man to higher levels of achievement. KERA’s first high-definition television (HDTV) documentary, inspired by the Fort Worth (Texas) Kimbell Art Museum’s exclusive exhibition, “Matisse & Picasso: A Gentle Rivalry,” brings together for the first time several key, visually compelling examples of the ongoing “game of chess” between two masters. Through historical photographs, spectacular, high-definition footage of rarely seen paintings, and apt critiques and comparisons of the painters’ works, the program reveals the unmatched inspiration that each man found in the art and intelligence of the other.
The 30-minute documentary includes interviews from Yve-Alain Bois, renowned art historian, Harvard professor, and guest curator for the Kimbell exhibition; and Rick Brettell, an independent curator and professor at the University of Texas at Dallas. The story also includes astute and sometimes surprising observations about both artists by Picasso’s companion for eight years, artist and author, Francoise Gilot.
The program begins in 1907 in Paris, where Matisse’s “Blue Nude” shocks the art world by breaking with traditional form and use of color; soon afterwards, Picasso responds with the equally shocking “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.” The painting is Picasso’s statement against tradition and a way to – in his words – “break away from beauty, from sentimentality.” The work challenges Matisse, and lays down the gauntlet for a lifetime of competitive taunting and prodding which eventually deepens into respectful acknowledgement, and a lifelong exchange of visual ideas.
The program tracks the arc of Matisse’s career: the acclaim he experienced in his thirties and forties as an undisputed master who painted with unbridled freedom; an unproductive period when he could find no inspiration; and, with the arrival of Cubism, Surrealism and political upheaval in Europe, the sneering disregard of art’s avant garde who considered him an anachronism.
Through it all, Picasso recognizes the enduring mastery of Matisse’s art and, over several decades continues to inspire Matisse to produce some of his best work. Matisse, for his part, is equal to the challenge and continually surprises Picasso with his insight, subtlety, and strength of personality. “No one has ever looked at the paintings of Henri Matisse more carefully than I,” said Picasso, “and no one has looked at mine more carefully than he.”
As Matisse’s health begins to fail, the program paints a picture of a deep and enduring friendship built on the exchange of work, mutual respect, and artistic nourishment each man found in the other. Finally, the program explores the work Picasso produces after the death of Matisse, a moving expression of his sorrow and a tribute to a friendship that began in rivalry and became a driving force behind two of the greatest of modern masters.
“Matisse & Picasso” is narrated by Salome Jens, a veteran stage and screen actress. Miguel Ferrer, a distinguished television and screen actor and voice performer, is the voice of Pablo Picasso. Television actor Robert Clary is the voice of Henri Matisse, and, providing the voice for Francoise Gilot is stage and screen actress Genevieve Bujold.
“Matisse & Picasso” is produced by KERA’s award-winning documentary team of Co-Producers/Directors Rob Tranchin and Ginny Martin, whose work includes a recent national Emmy for the four-part PBS series, “The U.S.-Mexican War (1846-1848)”; Producer Joe Bellotti; Executive Producer Rick Thompson; and Executive-in-Charge Sylvia Komatsu.
“Matisse & Picasso” is a production of KERA-Dallas/Fort Worth/Denton in association with the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas. The program is funded in part by a grant from The Forrest C. Lattner Foundation, and by PBS.
