GV: Thank you, Jansy, for your kind words about my work. I think your last assessment ("...your "originals" are all too mortal, and that they demand access to eternity through endless repetition (copies)") is quite correct, although I have never put it in those words. I am preoccupied witha kind of personal real-ness- like when you meet someone and they tell you their name, but in your mind, they will always have a different, more suitable name, the one you came up with moments before they introduced themselves. So in my drawings, although they don't really look like him, or resemble one another more than any set of distant cousins might, I am searching for some "real" moment, born out of the encounter between the eye looking at his photograph and the hand making a line.

As for "Cold Souls"- it sure got some pretty bad reviews, mostly people called it "Being Paul Giamatti", a riff on "Being John Malkovitch", referring to the theme of getting into one's own mind. I thought it was quite good, but I'll let you judge for yourself. The connections I found were quite small things, but it delighted me to find them, since I'm always happy to discover some little Nabokov wink in someone else's work. Firstly, in the movie, GIammatti's problems all begin when he is rehersing to play "Uncle Vanya" (Vanya is the love interest's pet name in The Eye) and finds the role too taxing on his delicate soul, moving him to seek a storage space for it so he can go about his job without being too tortured by it. Then there is The Eye's protagonist's referrence to the souls he sees or inhabits as "cold" or "radiant", which I thought was a direct influence to the movie's title.

On Sun, Jul 25, 2010 at 8:31 AM, Jansy <jansy@aetern.us> wrote:
Gabriela Vaisencher: "...I am a new arrival to the Nabokov group...Barbara Wyllie told me about it after we exchanged emails about a theory I had on the relationship between The Eye and Sophie Barthes' 2009 film, Cold Souls. (Has anyone seen it? I think The Eye was a big influence on it, but it is mentioned nowhere in relation to the movie. Any thoughts?) Also, I am a visual artist and have been using Nabokov's image in my drawings here and there. That's actually how I got in touch with Wyllie, I had gotten her book about him and was using the photos in it for my drawings and then decided to contact her. I'd like to share with everyone my work and would welcome any comments: http://gabrielavainsencher.com/?cat=3 -
JM: Sophie Barthe's movie was shown at the Rio Movie Festival, in 2009, and most of the critical reviews I read were unfavourable.
One suggested a mix of
Spike Jonze with Charlie Kaufman's "I want to be John Malkovich",1999 and CK' and Gondry's "Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind," 2003. Another critic added even more names ( I quote, in translation: "As if Woody Allen, Sofia Coppola, Stanley Kubrick, Roy Andersson ("Du Levande," 2007) e Michel Gondry] had all participated in a great cinematographical orgy"). Another included Stephen Frears run amok sequel to "Pretty, Dirty Things," 2002 and mentioned Nicolai Gogol ("souls" used as merchandise). It's true, though, that Nabokov is not as widely read in Brazil as he is in America and Europe and therefore it would be a surprise to find a reference to  him and any specific novel of his. As you see it, where lies "the relationship between The Eye and Sophie Barthes' 2009 film, Cold Souls"?
 
I greatly admired your works found at  http://gabrielavainsencher.com/?cat=3 , the soft texture of tissue paper and intense blues and purples, the agile line, the Magritte irony and a surly Nabokov.
You chose particularly evanescent materials for your original creation. I wonder if your intention has been to present particularly frail sets of "souls" - or were they intended to suggest the easily decomposed human "bodies"? My sensation (that's the only thing I can write about, not being a painter or draughtsperson myself) is that your "originals" are all too mortal, and that they demand access to eternity through endless repetition (copies).  
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--
Gabriela Vainsencher

+1 917 655 3173

www.gabrielavainsencher.com
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All private editorial communications, without exception, are read by both co-editors.