Everyone loves a good redemption story, and none is better than that of iconic art collector Peggy Guggenheim. Born into a family—and overall society—that disapproved of her choices, Peggy worked against odds and tragedies to become one of the biggest names in modern art. From hosting the first gallery shows of some of the most famous Abstract Expressionists—Jackson Pollock, Vasily Kandinsky, Mark Rothko—to smuggling masterpieces by Francis Picabia, Georges Braque, Salvador Dalí, and Piet Mondrian out of Nazi-occupied Paris, Peggy Guggenheim made a name for herself with her indelible spirit and genuine love for art.
Director Lisa Immordino Vreeland brings her story to life in Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict. The film, narrated by Peggy herself through archival tapes her biographer Jacqueline Bograd Weld recorded just before her death in 1979, is a vivid and unflinching look at the eccentric art collector’s past. The tapes allow for unprecedentedly intimate access, revealing new information about everything from her difficult childhood to her daughter’s suicide to her famous string of love affairs with the likes of Samuel Beckett and Max Ernst. What’s even better, you hear about all of it in her own words. Peggy’s narration makes the film feel three-dimensional, something many biographies are unable to achieve.
We caught up with Vreeland to discuss her inspirations behind the film and the process of piecing together Guggenheim’s history.
CHLOE MACKEY: Where did the focus on Peggy Guggenheim come from? How did you decide she was a good subject for a documentary?
LISA IMMORDINO VREELAND: I’ve always been really interested in [Peggy Guggenheim] and had the idea for a documentary on Abstract Expressionists. I was just really thinking about that moment in history. I majored in in Art History in college and ended up working in fashion, but I feel like the two worlds are so intertwined now.
So I was thinking about all of these Abstract Expressionists, and almost all of them had their first shows at [Guggenheim’s] gallery. So at some point, I said to myself, “Well, clearly it’s all about her.”
This is your second film, your first being Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, about the iconic Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue editor and your grandmother-in-law. Do you feel the two works are connected at all?
Yes, definitely. I see courageousness as a unifying factor in both of them. Yes, they are also both women, but it wasn’t about that. I don’t want to be seen as someone who just makes films about women. I am, however, attracted to strong women. There’s also this sense of reinvention with both of these women. I feel like you have two characters here who did not like themselves as children and wanted to step out of what their traditional boundaries were. They wanted to do something and they did: they created careers for themselves.
They’re also tied together because of my attraction to the 20th century. It was a time that was so rich, both culturally and historically.
Being a woman in a field that is as male-dominated as film, do you feel that you are attracted to these women’s stories because they both rose up to the challenge of making something of themselves professionally in a time where that was very difficult to do?
I don’t really think of myself through the angle of me being a woman in a field that is still very male-dominated, though I do agree that is the case. I feel that Peggy Guggenheim and Diana Vreeland were that way as well. They never thought of their chall
Director Lisa Immordino Vreeland brings her story to life in Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict. The film, narrated by Peggy herself through archival tapes her biographer Jacqueline Bograd Weld recorded just before her death in 1979, is a vivid and unflinching look at the eccentric art collector’s past. The tapes allow for unprecedentedly intimate access, revealing new information about everything from her difficult childhood to her daughter’s suicide to her famous string of love affairs with the likes of Samuel Beckett and Max Ernst. What’s even better, you hear about all of it in her own words. Peggy’s narration makes the film feel three-dimensional, something many biographies are unable to achieve.
We caught up with Vreeland to discuss her inspirations behind the film and the process of piecing together Guggenheim’s history.
CHLOE MACKEY: Where did the focus on Peggy Guggenheim come from? How did you decide she was a good subject for a documentary?
LISA IMMORDINO VREELAND: I’ve always been really interested in [Peggy Guggenheim] and had the idea for a documentary on Abstract Expressionists. I was just really thinking about that moment in history. I majored in in Art History in college and ended up working in fashion, but I feel like the two worlds are so intertwined now.
So I was thinking about all of these Abstract Expressionists, and almost all of them had their first shows at [Guggenheim’s] gallery. So at some point, I said to myself, “Well, clearly it’s all about her.”
This is your second film, your first being Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, about the iconic Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue editor and your grandmother-in-law. Do you feel the two works are connected at all?
Yes, definitely. I see courageousness as a unifying factor in both of them. Yes, they are also both women, but it wasn’t about that. I don’t want to be seen as someone who just makes films about women. I am, however, attracted to strong women. There’s also this sense of reinvention with both of these women. I feel like you have two characters here who did not like themselves as children and wanted to step out of what their traditional boundaries were. They wanted to do something and they did: they created careers for themselves.
They’re also tied together because of my attraction to the 20th century. It was a time that was so rich, both culturally and historically.
Being a woman in a field that is as male-dominated as film, do you feel that you are attracted to these women’s stories because they both rose up to the challenge of making something of themselves professionally in a time where that was very difficult to do?
I don’t really think of myself through the angle of me being a woman in a field that is still very male-dominated, though I do agree that is the case. I feel that Peggy Guggenheim and Diana Vreeland were that way as well. They never thought of their chall