A film starring the US artist Cindy Sherman as an ageing diva is due to be launched next month at a concert in Greece by the US musician Rufus Wainwright. Sherman’s character in the film, which is directed by the Italian artist Francesco Vezzoli, is modelled on the late, great opera singer Maria Callas.
The piece will be shown during the first half of a performance of Wainwright’s opera Prima Donna at the Odeon of Herode Atticus in Athens (15 September).
“The video was shot last May in Paris at Théâtre des Variétés, featuring Cindy as the quintessential opera diva. The film depicts fictional, pivotal chapters of the singer's life and career, in her full glory and darker situations, showing her fading away,” Vezzoli says.
Sherman wore some of Callas’s original costumes, which were borrowed from the Tirelli costume archives in Rome. The artist told Vanity Fair magazine: “What made me want to do it is the fear that the character is going through. She’s old now. Can she live up to her audience’s expectations? I think it’ll free me up to just let it all hang out.”
Meanwhile, an exhibition of Vezzoli’s work, due to open at Almine Rech gallery in London next month (8 September-3 October), will include a new sculptural installation entitled Eternal Kiss. The piece comprises two life-size marble heads bought at auction—a Roman bust of a man and a Roman portrait of a woman, both dating from the second century—installed on the same pedestal.
“The male head is reclined towards the female. The aim of the work is to create the most ancient sculpture of a kiss in existence,” says Vezzoli.