KCRW’s The Business offers a fascinating interview with visual artist and filmmaker Julian Schnabel on his perspective and approach to film.
As an internationally renowned visual artist, whose works hang in major museums and draw big-ticket sales figures, Schnabel is in a unique position to draw financing, and to explore the film medium as an art rather than a business. For many of his films, he guaranteed the financing investment with his own art works. And for many, he was a significant investor himself.
Of particular interest (to me anyway) is his response to a question about all the ‘mundane’ tasks that go between completing a film and getting it to market — promos, one-sheets, advertising, and other marketing. To which he says:
”That’s not mundane, actually. After you make the thing, you have to mediate it into the world.”
Which is a rather elegant way of describing the purpose and focus of marketing, as part of (or at least partner to) the canvas of the creative work.
