Without Gorky

Synopsis

Without Gorky is a personal journey into a powerful family tragedy. At the centre of the film are the conversations between the director, Cosima, and her grandmother, Mougouch. The whole family has been shaped by the legacy left by Cosima’s grandfather: the Abstract Expressionist painter Arshile Gorky. His suicide in 1948 still echoes and disturbs the family. Gorky was an elusive character who escaped the Armenian genocide and reinvented himself as a romantic artist in New York in the 30s.

Director Biography

Born in Italy in an artists’ family, and moved to England at fourteen. A university degree in Anthropology and Art History at the School of Oriental and African Studies cultivated my interest in local identity and ethnic traditions, whether in Africa, Asia or Europe.