F. Scott Hess: A Reluctant Realist
A documentary film by Shirin Bazleh
“A NEW OLD MASTER”
- Donald Kuspit, Art Historian and Author
Hess' s impeccable skills and encyclopedic knowledge of the history of Art have allowed him to explore
the relation between artistic representation and reality
- Jerome Meyer, Educator, Yale University
"Hess is probably the most sophisticated narrative painter of our time"
- Lori Escalera, Artist
"This documentary will inspire, befuddle and surprise your senses"
- Grady Williams, Educator
Film Synopsis:
When Scott was seven, his biological father left the family. From the wound that this abandonment created, the artist F. Scott Hess was born. This documentary gives insight into the complex and visionary artistry ofHess, one of America's most prolific figurative artists who uses Dutch Master technique to depict realistic scenes of contemporary life with symbolic and allegorical events, humor, eroticism, and voyeurism.
The film follows Hess’s personal and artistic journey that leads to finding his biological father after a 32 year absence. Once reunited, he discovers his own intriguing paternal history. He spends the next six years creating a mock National Exhibit, called The Paternal Suit, consisting of over 100 paintings, prints, and objects created byHess, but presented as legitimate historical artifacts. Hess does not claim authorship for the works on display. Instead, he ascribes to them fictional artists, questioning the authority of perceived truths through the prism of his dubious 400 year paternal family history.
Art historians, critics and collectors share their perspective on Scott's importance in today's Modern Art scene as we follow him launching his National Exhibit in Charleston SC and Long Beach Museum of Art; and his Retrospective at LA Municipal Barnsdall Gallery and Cal State Fullerton Begovich Gallery.
About F. Scott Hess:
Born in Baltimore in 1955,Hess spent six years in Europe before moving to Los Angeles at 29. He hadcompleted four years at Austria's Academy of Fine Arts, where Rudolf Hausner, afounder of the post-World War II Vienna School of Fantastic Realism, was aprimary influence. Fantastic Realism applied figurative techniques in OldMaster painting to progressive social subjects. Running afoul of orthodox Surrealismfor using judicious thought in a movement that prized irrationality, it alsooperated counter to the era's promotion of abstract art. While in Vienna Hess wasawarded Austria's prestigious Theodor Körner Prize in1981. His first solo exhibition was atGalerie Herzog in Vienna, Austria in 1979, followed shortly thereafter by groupexhibitions in Germany, France, and a second solo exhibition in Vienna's TabakMuseum in 1982.
Hess employs compositions, individual figures, palettes, literary sources and additional techniques familiar from Titian, Michelangelo, Durer, Courbet and countless others, as well as from popular culture. You're more likely to find a direct quotation from Henry Fuseli or an allusion to Susanna and the Elders than "Law andOrder," but both are in there.
His work is in the collections of the LosAngeles County Museum of Art, The Oakland Museum of California, the OrangeCounty Museum of Art, The Smithsonian Institute, the San Jose Museum of Art,the Boise Art Museum, the Laguna Art Museum and the Long Beach Museum of Art.
A recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Visual Fellowship and a J. Paul Getty MuseumIndividual Artist’s Fellowship, Hess has lived in Los Angeles since 1984 andhis works have been purchased by Los Angeles County Museum of Art, San Jose Museum of Art, Orange County Museum ofArt, Pasadena Museum ofCalifornia Art, Oakland Museum of California, the Smithsonian Institution, Long Beach Museum of Art,and the Bahman Cultural House, Tehran, Iran, among others as part of their permanent collections. In 2014 Hess had a comprehensive retrospective curatedby Mike McGee and split between the Begovich Gallery at California State University-Fullerton, and the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery. A full monograph encompassing the works in the retrospective, and entitled 'F. Scott Hess' was published in 2014 by Grand Central Press and Gingko Press, with essays by Mike McGee, Doug Harvey, Leah Ollman, and John Seed. Hess was an Associate Professor at the Laguna College of Art and Design's BFA and MFA programs till 2018. He is currently working on a 12 panel synagogue history mural cycle in B'nai Jehudah's renovated building in Overland Park, KS
About the Filmmaker:
Writer, Producer, Director Shirin Bazleh was born and raised in Abadan, Iran. She moved to the United States after high school and studied film and communications at Emerson College, Boston and completed graduate school at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. Bazleh has worked in the film and television industry for the past 25 years. Her documentary work includes directing/producing a documentary on Mother Teresa (An Intimate Portrait 1997 –Winner of Gracie Award), The Young Kennedy Women (1996), writing/editing a feature length documentary with Dali Lama (Not in God’s Name 2007) , writing/editing a documentary about the former queen of Iran (The Queen and I – HBO 2009). F. Scott Hess: A Reluctant Realist (2019) is her latest documentary on the life and provocative work of LA based artist, F. Scott Hess .
Bazleh lives in Los Angeles and has also been an editor on over 100 hours of television programs.
