Julian Schnabel, the American colossus of art on Museum TV

Julian Schnabel is an art giant.

By his stature, imposing and massive, by his natural authority which makes him impose himself immediately in an assembly, even if he comes in silk pajamas and flip-flops to a Parisian opening.

Leonine mane and dark glasses, this hyperactive walks the streets of the world as if they belonged to him.

he asks his driver as he arrives in Campania from Paris.

," he replies.

, rectifies, as a triumphant hero, this painter who bears the years well.

The very large paintings that made his reputation

He was adored in New York from a very young age in the 1980s with his famous paintings in broken plates, inspired by Gaudi's Park Güell in Barcelona.

(2004) follows the exhibition of his works, from 1978 to 2003, which stopped in Frankfurt, Madrid, before Naples.

He says:

The very large paintings that made its reputation - the huge portraits of young girls barred with black on the horizon of the gaze, the play of paint stains on velvet - still rest on the ground like giants stranded in a previous shipwreck.

The wooden structure that supports them is already in itself a superhuman architecture.

Seeing the assembly of these monsters of paintings is quite fascinating.

At each exhibition, the canvases are removed from their frames, rolled up, put in tubes, then boxes, also giant.

Barely landed, Julian Schnabel speaks with the Italian technicians, Paco, Federico, as if he had known them forever.

Marina Zenovich's documentary for Museum TV's "Art in progress" introduces this American icon to younger generations.

," insists a commentator.

Hours of glory and oblivion

Since his induction into the Venice Biennale in 1980, the painter has known hours of glory and oblivion.

And a lot of recognition as a filmmaker, which sometimes harmed his reputation as a painter:

(1996), with an amazing Bowie as Warhol;

in 2000 with Javier Bardem in the skin of the Cuban poet Reinaldo Arenas,

in 2018, a beautiful reflection on moving painting with Willem Dafoe as Van Gogh.

His great friend, the late Dennis Hopper, appeared as a star on the screen to praise the atypical artist:

Basquiat

Before Nightfall.

His daughter Stella, whom he painted in a famous red portrait in broken plates, explains why she is angry on this other full-length painting, with whip.

Enveloping and charming, Julian Schnabel lets his daughter do the talking, as a patriarch or as a king of self-promotion.

Confident, arrogant, charming, pleasure-loving, artist in short!

,” says one close to him.

False modesty, denigrating one's own work and refusing to criticize that of others is the ball of the hypocrites, slice Schnabel.

This portrait, a little disjointed and not factual enough, remains fascinating as soon as Julian Schnabel talks about his art.