About the Film

Synopsis

How does art survive in a time of oppression? During the Soviet rule artists who stay true to their vision are executed, sent to mental hospitals or Gulags.

Their plight inspires young Igor Savitsky. He pretends to buy state-approved art but instead daringly rescues 40,000 forbidden fellow artist's works and creates a museum in the desert of Uzbekistan, far from the watchful eyes of the KGB. Though a penniless artist himself, he cajoles the cash to pay for the art from the same authorities who are banning it. Savitsky amasses an eclectic mix of Russian Avant-Garde art. But his greatest discovery is an unknown school of artists who settle in Uzbekistan after the Russian revolution of 1917, encountering a unique Islamic culture, as exotic to them as Tahiti was for Gauguin. They develop a startlingly original style, fusing European modernism with centuries-old Eastern traditions.

Ben Kingsley, Sally Field and Ed Asner voice the diaries and letters of Savitsky and the artists. Intercut with recollections of the artists' children and rare archival footage, the film takes us on a dramatic journey of sacrifice for the sake of creative freedom. Described as "one of the most remarkable collections of 20th century Russian art" and located in one of the world's poorest regions, today these paintings are worth millions, a lucrative target for Islamic fundamentalists, corrupt bureaucrats and art profiteers. The collection remains as endangered as when Savitsky first created it, posing the question whose responsibility is it to preserve this cultural treasure.

AMANDA POPE
Director, Producer, Writer

Emmy award winning director Amanda Pope's directing, producing, writing, and editing credits over her more than 20 year long career include documentary, dramatic, and social advocacy programs. Her work has focused on the dynamics of creativity in fine art, public art happenings, urban design, theatre and dance. Her award-winning public television documentaries:  Jackson Pollock Portrait, Stages: Houseman Directs Lear, narrated by Jason Robards and Cities for People, narrated by Cloris Leachman have all been broadcast nationally on PBS. Her program series, Faces Of Change, documented grassroots reformers and emerging leaders in seven countries of the former USSR.  Most recently she directed The Legend Of Pancho Barnes And The Happy Bottom Riding Club about a pioneer woman aviator.  The film was honored with a 2011 Los Angeles Area Emmy in the arts and culture/history category, broadcast over 1200 times on American Public Television for PBS and featured at numerous festivals and screening venues. Amanda has served on the Board of New York Women in Film, the Women in Film Foundation in Los Angeles, and has been a jury member for the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences student films, The Humanitas Prize, and the International Documentary Association's feature documentaries. Amanda is a Professor in production at the University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts.

TCHAVDAR GEORGIEV
Director, Producer, Writer, Editor

Tchavdar Georgiev is a writer, producer, director and editor who has crafted award-winning films, commercials and television both in the US and abroad.
He directed together with Dana Berry for National Geographic Finding the Next Earth and edited Alien Earths, nominated for a Prime Time Emmy. He was one of the editors on the documentaries We Live in Public (Grand Jury Prize at Sundance) and One Lucky Elephant (Best Doc Editing Award at Woodstock Film Festival) as well as the narrative feature Bastards (MTV Russia Best Film Award). He edited Divining the Human: The Cathedral Tapestries of John Nava, narrated by Edward James Olmos, Marion´s Triumph, narrated by Debra Messing and View from a Grain of Sand (nominated for an IDA award) - all of which premiered on PBS. He was also an editor on the award-winning documentaries Refusenik, Maybe Baby and Holy Warriors. He is currently editing the documentary Valentine Road for Bunim Murray Productions.
He produced the feature thriller Nevsky Prospect for Amazon Studios (a division of Amazon.com) and field produced USA Network’s Covert Affairs “Horse to Water” episode. His field producing credits also include projects for History Channel, Simon Wiesenthal Center, SF1 (Switzerland), Channel 1 and MTV (Russia). He has produced commercials for Adobe, Cisco, NASA and TELE2 Mobile Europe and edited for Honda, Oscar de la Renta, Rooms to Go, TELE2 and MTV Russia. He also directed and produced a permanent multi-media installation on Perestroika for the Museum of Russian Jewish Tolerance in Moscow (the largest Jewish one in Europe).
Tchavdar was awarded an MFA from the USC School of Cinematic Arts and a BFA from the Art Institute of Chicago.

ALEXANDER DOLGIN
Cinematographer

Alexander Dolgin has shot numerous documentary projects for Russian TV as well as PBS, ZDF and ARTE. His work on Moscow Night Music wasawarded best cinematography at the Moscow film festival "Moscow Pegasys" and his work Day and Hour at the Babelsberg Film Festival. He was also honored with the "Courtens D'Or" Award at the 9th Festival of Russian Art and Cinema in Nice for directing the film-opera Einstein & Margarita which also participated in the 31th Moscow Film Festival. Alexander graduated from Moscow State Institute of Cinematography in 1987. He is a member of the Russian Filmmakers Union.

GENNADI BALITSKI
Cinematographer

Gennadi Balitski photographed the award-winning Lana's Rain as well as a number of other independent feature films including La Migra, Drive By, Once Upon a Time in the Hood and 29 and Holding. His cinematography in commercials includes work for Oscar de la Renta, Liz Claiborne, Ashley Furniture, Karastan and Rooms To Go. He has also worked as a producer for TELE 2 Europe and MTV Russia. His fashion photography clients include Cindy Crawford.

MIRIAM CUTLER
Composer

Miriam Cutler is an Emmy nominated composer who has been writing, producing and performing music for over 25 years and has an extensive background scoring for independent film, television and non-fiction. Her documentary credits include: Ghosts of Abu Ghraib, Thin, Family Affair, The Fence, Ethel,  Chris and Don: A Love Story, China Blue, Absolute Wilson, Lost In La Mancha, Pandemic: Facing AIDS and many more. Additionally, she has served as an advisor for the Sundance Institute Documentary Composers Lab, as well as on documentary juries for the Sundance Film Festival, Independent Spirit Awards, International Documentary Association Awards, and American Film Institute's Film Festival Awards, and is on the Board of The Society of Composers and Lyricists. She is currently co-producing a documentary about an American elephant, which she will also score.

Director's Statement

We were filming in Tashkent, Uzbekistan just finishing a two year production on grassroots reformers in the former Soviet Union. Neither of us had ever been to Central Asia before and tales of Uzbekistan's ancient Silk Road and the fabled blue-tiled domes of Samarkand, one of ancient world's most dazzling capitals, sparked our interest. But then we were told of a cultural treasure from our own time, a museum of Soviet era forbidden Avant-Garde art in a far off desert at the extreme Western border of Uzbekistan. The improbability of the story was arresting: an amazing art collection, created single-handedly by one penniless man, in the desert, a poor region, in an Islamic country suspicious of art created by their former colonizers.

We have both been drawn to stories about stubborn, unsung people with vision who challenge the boundaries of their times. We first met as professor and student at University of Southern California's film school. Our partnership on equal footing across generations might have seemed unlikely. But we complimented each other perfectly. Having grown up in the former USSR, Tchavdar had his roots in Eastern European and Russian culture, while Amanda's strength came from a background in teaching and making documentary films on art and the dynamics of creativity.

What we discovered in the stories surrounding the Savitsky Collection, was a constellation of indomitable idealists. First there were the artists like Yevgeny Lysenko whose blue bull painting Fascism Is Advancing was labeled anti-Soviet. His creativity landed him in a mental hospital. There was the original Collector who defied a totalitarian regime and amassed 40,000 artworks for his museum often by giving IOU's promising payment in 10 or 12 years. And finally we met the current Museum director, Marinika Babanzarova, who has fought off government bureaucrats and art sharks as they tried to raid the prizes of the Collection, and Islamic fundamentalists ready to destroy the art just as they did the great Bamiyan sculptures in Afghanistan.

We realized we had the opportunity in this story to explore 80 years of an ever-changing relationship between the Islamic world and the West through the lens of artists who lived in these times.

Unfortunately, due to political and economic conditions in Central Asia today, the Savitsky Collection could cease to exist in its present form at any time. We hope this film will function as an advocacy tool and a catalyst to protect this unique 20th century cultural institution.

Amanda Pope & Tchavdar Georgiev

Nukus Museum

Nukus Museum of Art or, in full, The Savitsky Karalkapakstan Art Museum, named after Igor Savitsky, is an art museum located in Nukus, Uzbekistan. Opened in 1966, the museum houses a collection of over 82,000 items, ranging from antiquities from Khorezm to Karakalpak folk art, Uzbek fine art and, uniquely, the second largest collection of Russian Avant-Garde in the world (after the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg). The museum represents the life's work of Igor Savitsky

The museum represents the life's work of Igor Savitsky.

Igor Savitsky, Founder

The Russian painter, archeologist and collector, Igor Savitsky, first visited Karakalpakstan in 1950 to participate in the Khorezm Archeological and Ethnographic Expedition and later moved to Nukus, Karakalpakstan's capital, and continued living there until his death in Moscow in 1984. During 1957-66, he assembled an extensive collection of Karakalpak jewellery, carpets, coins, clothing and other artifacts, convinced the authorities of the need for a museum, and, following its establishment, was appointed its curator in 1966.

Thereafter, he began collecting the works of Central Asian artists, including Alexander Volkov, Ural Tansykbayev and Victor Ufimtsev of the Uzbek school, and later those of the Russian avant-garde — including Kliment Redko, Lyubov Popova, Mukhina, Ivan Koudriachov and Robert Falk — whose paintings, although already recognized in Western Europe (especially in France), had been banned in the Soviet Union during Stalin's rule and through the 1960s.

Despite the risk of being denounced as an "enemy of the people", Savitsky sought out proscribed painters and their heirs to collect, archive and display their works; and, with great courage, he managed to assemble thousands of Russian avant-garde and post avant-garde paintings. Moreover, refuting the Socialist Realism school, the collection shook the foundations of that period of art history.

It was not until perestroika in 1985—the year after he died — that Savitsky's remarkable achievements and collections were truly acknowledged, and not until 1991 — when Uzbekistan became independent — that Nukus, a remote 'closed' city during the Soviet Union, became accessible to the outside world.

Marinika Babanazorova - Director and Curator

In her twenty-five year career as the Director of the Museum, Marinika Babanazarova has been involved in the presentation of more than 20 exhibitions, including shows in France, Germany, and around the former Soviet Union. Her articles have been featured in five of the exhibition catalogues, including the best seller of the year Avantgard, Ostanovlennyi na Begu (Avant-Garde Stopped on the Run). In 2006, she was honored as a University of Southern California Provost's Distinguished Visitor. Ms. Babanazarova has studied at the Louvre and the British Museum, and participated in numerous international conferences on the cultural and artistic traditions of Central Asia. She received her degree in Art History from the Tashkent Art Institute in 1990. She was a member of the Karakalpak parliament from 1995-1999, and is a member of the Central Elections committee of the Republic of Uzbekistan.

Friends of Nukus Museum

Set up initially in Tashkent as an informal group during the early 1990s and later registered in Karakalpakstan as a non-governmental organization (NGO) in 2001, the Friends of Nukus Museum (FoNM) is a small, but dedicated international network of advocates and supporters. In 2007, it was re-constituted as the Friends of Nukus Museum Foundation, a Dutch registered charity. The FoNM works with the Museum's Director on a range of practical issues, such as development of the Museum's long-term development strategy, liaising with donors and other museums to exhibit the Collection abroad, even down to the more mundane, but very essential, translation assistance and marketing advice.

Credit

WRITTEN, PRODUCED AND DIRECTED BY

Amanda Pope

Tchavdar Georgiev



IGOR SAVITSKY'S VOICE BY

Ben Kingsley



ARTISTS' VOICES BY

Sally Field

Ed Asner

Igor Paramonov



EDITED BY

Tchavdar Georgiev



SCORE COMPOSED AND PRODUCED BY

Miriam Cutler



CINEMATOGRAPHY

Alexander Dolgin

Gennadi Balitski



ASSOCIATE PRODUCER AND RESEARCHER

Etery Sakontikova



RESEARCHER

Ekaterina Sakontikova



SOUND RECORDIST

Adam King



SOUND DESIGN BY

Joe Dzuban

Raj Patil



SOUND RE-RECORDING MIXER

Joe Dzuban



TITLE & MOTION GRAPHICDESIGN BY

inMotion Studios

  

PRODUCER

Stephen Fromkin 

  

DESIGNER & ANIMATOR

Harold De Jesus

  

ANIMATOR

Marcel Valcarce



COLORIST

Brian Hutchings



DIGITAL CONSULTANT

Matt Radecki



STORY CONSULTANTs

Miriam Cutler

Lisa Leeman

Kate Amend

Mark Harris



INDEPENDENT FILM CONSULTANT

Robert Hawk



ADDITIONAL CINEMATOGRAPHY

John Ealer

Chad Wilson

Clay Westervelt

Daniel Pfisterer

Erick Green



ADDITIONAL GAFFER

Jim Andre

Emily Topper



ADDITIONAL SOUND

Valery Ermakov

Gentry Smith



TRANSLATORS AND TRANSCRIBERS

Yuliya Volkhonovych

Dimitriy Barabanov

Adele de Ruocco

Katya Kudriavtseva

Oleg Minin

John Narins

Elena Vassilieva

Yvonee Foong

Cabell Smith

Stephanie Young



PRODUCTION ASSISTANTS

Jason Barbagelott

Paolo Borraccetti

Andrejs Kovalovs



ASSISTANT EDITORS

Andrejs Kovalovs

Yasmin Assemi

Justin Kelley

Matt Rittorno



ADDITIONAL GRAPHICS

Andrejs Kovalovs



ARCHIVAL STILLS ENHANCEMENT

Alexander Dolgin



PRODUCTION STILLS

Ernest Kurtveliev





THANKS TO ALL THOSE WHO APPEAR IN THE FILM:

 

Marinika Babanazarova

Olga Belenikina

John Bowlt

Sergei and Alla Efuni

Lidia Iovleva

Kalibek Kamalov

Alexei Kandinsky

Stephen Kinzer

Irina Korovay

Jildasbek Kuttimuratov

Andrei Sarabianov

Alvina Schpade

Alexander Tereshenko

Lubov Truskova

Alexander Volkov

Maria Volkov

Valery Volkov

Militza Zemskaya

 

AND THANKS TO THOSE WHO GENEROUSLY PARTICIPATED,

BUT ARE NOT IN THE FINAL FILM:

 

Natalia Adaskina

Dinara Babanazarova

Nazira Babanazarova

Sergei Khrushchev

David Pearce

Nancy Perloff

Aigul Pirnazarova

Irina Pronina

Damir Ruzibaev

Elizabeth Sanasarian

Alexandra Shatskikh

Valentina Sychova

Svetlana Turutina

Andrei Volkov

Vadim Yagodin

 

PAINTINGS, ARCHIVAL FILM & PHOTOGRAPHS

AP Archive

Archive of the Repressed Victims of the former Soviet Union in Uzbekistan

Corbismotion

Getty Images

Max Penson Collection, courtesy of Maxime Penson

Mosfilm Cinema Concern

Museum of the People of the East

Russian Archive of Documentary Films & Photographs

Russian State Archive of Literature and Art

Smithsonian Institution

The State Russian Museum

The State Tretyakov Gallery

The Wende Museum

Ural Tansykbaev Memorial Museum

Uzteleradio

Volkov and Rybnikov families



Marc Chagall, "The Soldier Drinks" 

courtesy Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York,

Solomon R. Guggenheim Founding Collection, by gift



Paul Gauguin, "In the Vanilla Grove, Man and Horse"

courtesy Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York,

Thannhauser Collection, Gift, Justin K. Thannhauser



Paul Gauguin, "Self-Portrait" 

courtesy of Musee d'Orsay, Paris, France,

Photo Credit: Scala/Art Resource, NY



Paul Gauguin, "Where Do We Come From?

What Are We?  Where Are We Going?"

courtesy of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA.

Tompkins Collection — Arthur Gordon Thompkins Fund



Vincent van Gogh, "Landscape with Snow" 

courtesy Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York,

Thannhauser Collection, Gift, Hilde Thannhauser



Natalia Goncharova, "Harvest" 

courtesy of the Omsk District Museum of Visual Arts, Russia



Natalia Goncharova,"St. Michael the Archistrategus"

from her series 'Mystical Images of War' 

courtesy of the Research Library, The Getty Research Institute,

Los Angeles, CA



Wassily Kandinsky, "All Saints"

courtesy of the Stadtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, 

Munich, Germany



Mark Y. Kaplan, "V.I. Lenin in 1917" 

courtesy of The Wende Museum, 

Los Angeles, CA



Mikhail A. Kostin, "In the Stalin Factory"

courtesy, Friend of the Springville Museum of Art,

Springville, Utah



Georges Seurat, "The Morning Walk"

courtesy of The National Gallery, 

London/Art Resource, NY



Alexander  N. Volkov, "Hoeing of the Field,"

State Russian Museum, 

St. Petersburg



ALL ARTWORKS NOT OTHERWISE CREDITED COME FROM

THE SAVITSKY COLLECTION AT THE KARAKALPAKSTAN STATE ART MUSEUM



MUSIC CREDITS

Yussi - balalaika, mandolaika, octave mandolin, mandolin

Yuval Ron - cumbus, saz, oud

Stephanie Bennett - harp

Charlie Adelphia - ney, duduk, various ethnic flutes, tsorna

Max Baxter - woodwinds, saxes

Nicholas Ariondo - accordion (courtesy ACCO-Music)

Louis Durra - piano

Carl Sealove - bass

Paso Doble - strings

MB Gordy - dhol, doyra, tombek, dumbek,

phase shakers, riq, spanish tambourine, daf



Score Orchestrated by Desha Dunnahoe

Score Recorded and Mixed by Les Brockmann



"Soky Nomay Bayat/Ufary Bayst" and "Rohat (Pleasure)"

field recordings by Deben Bhattacharya, taken from the album "The Music of Uzbekistan" EUCD 1805

Courtesy of ARC Music Productions International Ltd.



EQUIPMENT

Alternative Rentals

Coffey Sound

Constant Change Picture Vehicles

Edgewise Media

Hollywood Bob's Movie Cars

Ragtime Rentals

USC SCA

Wooden Nickel



PROPS

Art Wave

Stalin Painting & Russian license plate — Philip Jones

Textiles courtesy of Cheri Hunter

(Textiles shown in this film were lawfully obtained outside Uzbekistan.)

The Wende Museum

Warner Brothers Studios Property Dept

USC Roski School of Art



ACCOUNTING

Larry Ganzer, Stephanie Truex (The Allegent Group)



POST PRODUCTION SERVICES

Silhouette Films

Different by Design



ADDITIONAL POST PRODUCTION SERVICES

VPTV England

Todd-AO West

Bruce Hanifan Productions

Disney Studios

USC School of Cinematic Arts

Advanced Digital Services, Inc.

MG Digital



NON-PROFIT PARTNER

International Documentary Association



SPECIAL THANKS



Jonathan Ahdout 

Konstantin Akinsha

Steve Albrezzi

Robert Alderette

Jan Aldrin

Chris Andrews

Erik Bertellotti

Mitchell Block

Lisa Blok

Doug Blush

Fritzie Brown

Ann Burchell

Chris Cain

Chris Callister

Sung Rok Choi

Don and Marilyn Conlan

Midge Costin

Ian Crozier

Roozbah Dadvand

Dean Elizabeth Daley

Carole Dean

A.J. Dickerson

Richard Dion

Alicia Dwyer

Dave Florek

Eric Furie

Elena Gasparova

Beata, Boris, Arielle Georgiev

Bella, Georgi & Emil Georgiev

Yana Gorskaya

Greg & Kathy Guroff

Philip Jones

Amy Halpin

Bruce Hanifan

A.A. Dr. Hathout

Silke Hilger

Fiona Hill

Darrin Holender

Selma Holo

Richard Hyland

Judy Irola

Candice Jacobs

Justin Jampol

Ludmila Kan

Andy Kay

Zubeida Khan

Naim Karimov

Ed Kasinec

Gail Kearns

Susan Kechekian

Marsha Kinder

Mark Konecny

Yelena Kravtsova

Roger Lane

Greg Lanesey

Eugene Lazarev

Ari Levinson

Phil Linson

Sally Long-Innes

Jason Martinez

Heidi McCormack

Bob McRae

Murad Megalli

Tom Miller

Trevor Norris

Carlos Ortega

Penny Paine

David Pearce

German Pinchevsky

Zazi Pope & Jack Cairl

Hon. Joseph Presel

Yelena Rachitsky

Ruth Rauch

Thomas Roberdeau

Elena Romanova

Azade-Ayse Rorlich

Sandra Ruch

Stan Rosen

Hon. Sodyq Safaev

Elizabeth Sanasarian

Carolyn See

Marat Seidanov

Simone Sheffield

Roman and Yana Shukman

Jerry Sicherman

Michael Silton

Cabell Smith & Einstein the dog

Mary Smith

Ann-Elizabeth Sobieski

Marcelo Sotenberg

Nick Spark

Alan Starbuck

Susan Steiner

Jane Stewart

Tokhir Sultanov

David Tlapek

John Tower

Michael Trainor

Robbie Tucker

Greg Vannoy

Joe Wallenstein

Jennifer Warren

Morrie Warshawski

Rosamond Westmoreland

Thomas Whiting

Dick Wirth

Monique Zavistovski

 

FUNDING PROVIDED BY THE FOLLOWING FOUNDATIONS, INSTITUTIONS AND INDIVIDUALS:

National Endowment for the Arts

Open Society Institute

SahanDaywi Foundation

USC Zumberge Research Grant

USC Provost's Distinguished Visitors Program

USC School of Cinematic Arts

Lois M. O'Brien M.D.

Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation

CEC Artslink

Center for Jewish Culture and Creativity

The Cynthia Lasker Foundation

Sarah Carey

Roy W. Dean Award

Ellen Katzman

Patricia Finkel

Rosalie Kornblau



WITH THANKS FOR THEIR GENEROUS SUPPORT

Friends of the Nukus Museum

'Jahon' Information Agency at the Foreign Ministry of Uzbekistan

Institute of Modern Russian Culture, USC

Oak Park Public Library, Chicago

The Eurasia Foundation

The Foundation for International Arts and Education

The Ministry of Culture and Sports of Karakalpakstan

The Ministry of Culture and Sports of Uzbekistan

The Savitsky Collection at the Karakalpakstan State Art Museum

Women's Luncheon Group



Igor Savitsky's words are based on his writings and recollections of those who knew him.



Shot on location in Russia, Uzbekistan and the United States



In memoriam of John Rauch and Svetlana Turutina