February 3 - May 22, 2006

House of Photography/Deichtorhallen

the exhibition on the life and work of charles chaplin

Charles Chaplin (1899 - 1977) is not only one of the world’s best known artists, he is also an icon of the 20th Century. Hat, cane and moustache, waddling walk: these attributes make up a picture that even today after over 90 years are immediately recognizable as Charlie Chaplin.

The House of Photography in the Deichtorhallen exclusively in Germany will be showing the first comprehensive museum’s exhibition on Charles Chaplin from February 3rd to May 28th, 2006. Photographs and films from his personal archive show him as a timeless and highly modern inventor of pictures and portrayals of human beings.

For the first time, the central role that photography played in his work is illuminated. The figure of the tramp, for example, arose out of the dialogue with this medium. Furthermore, the exhibition traces „Chaplin’s universe“ with obsessional themes such as persecution hunts, the cunning of the socially weak and the struggle with speech and sound film („talkies.“)

The new edition of the films in digital technique allows for a lively confrontation with selected scenes and film excerpts. Also some unknown films are to be shown: the filming of „The Dictator“ (in color) and Super-8 family films from the 1960’s in which Chaplin as a white-haired father acts out the old scenes once again.

250 photographs, (from formerly inaccessible family property among which were Chaplin’s own storyboards), films, posters, and the hommages of other artists such as Fernand Léger show a „new“ Charlie Chaplin. His inexhaustible wealth of imagination and productivity in the last century can only be compared to that of Picasso.

Curators: Sam Stourdzé and Christian Delage, Paris

An exhibition by NBC, Paris in cooperation with the Deichtorhallen, Hamburg, the Musée du Jeu de Paume, Paris and the Kunsthal Rotterdam.