"Pictures Reframed" is a media project that materialized in 2008 to bring together Norwegian pianist Leif Ove Andsnes and South African visual artist Robin Rhode. Andsnes himself wanted a collaboration with an artist from another art medium; the choice of a visual artist for Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition thus seems quite natural. Mussorgsky himself found inspiration for his piano suite in the paintings of Russian painter Viktor Hartmann. In a way, Pictures Reframed works as the reverse process in which Mussorgsky's music would inspire the visual artist to come up with new images of his own (of course after research on the original composition itself).
EMI classics has released both the standard CD release of Andsnes's performance of Pictures at an Exhibition (coupled with Schumann's Kinderszenen) and this deluxe edition which includes the same CD recording, a DVD with a complete performance of Pictures Reframed at the Risor Festival, a documentary on the realization of the project and a book with color prints of Robin Rhode's images used for the performances. The deluxe edition is indeed quite a staggeringly elaborate object.
The main reason for anyone to purchase this extravagant CD/DVD/Artwork combo in the first place is of course Leif Ove Andsnes's interpretation of Mussorgsky's most famous piano composition. Andsnes gives a very strong performance that combines passion, warmth and elegance. As is confirmed by his Rachmaninoff recordings, Andsnes is quite at home in Russian piano music. His playing is characterized by completely assured technique, beautiful singing tone, unfailing innate musicality and a control that prevents any harshness in sound. He characterizes every single movement without ever "getting in the way". Highlights include a colorful Gnomus, a playful Tuileries, a shimmering Con mortuis and a Gate of Kiev that properly serves as the entire suite's climax. Andsnes slightly downplays the aggressiveness and violence of the work, favoring musical flow over flashy show-off, but his eschewal of eccentric touches results in possibly one of the safest, most pleasing interpretations on disc. Andsnes admits to making his own alterations to the score to enhance Mussorgsky's piano writing, pointing out Horowitz's transcriptions as his own inspiration. These minor changes to the score might irritate some listeners; but let's admit that Mussorgsky's writing in Pictures is not completely idiomatic in the first place, and we can rest assured that in Andsnes's playing they sound as natural and inspired as they can be. Andsnes's live performance on the DVD is even finer than the studio recording. His performance of Schumann's Kinderszenen is similarly accomplished, but could benefit from more variation in tone and color.
The accompanying DVD is possibly the raison d'etre for this release; it is wonderfully resourceful. We get a full performance of Andsnes and Rhode's project at the Risor Chamber Music Festival in the summer of 2009. The whole concept is more straightforward than it sounds from the marketing: Robin Rhode's idea is to stage a group of screens around Andsnes's piano, the central screen being the one on which his images are projected. Robin Rhode's contribution is a mixture of still images, digital animation and live videos aimed to enhance Mussorgsky's music. Being an expert on street art and graffiti, Rhode's style is clearly demonstrated in his images. The best moments take place when Rhode actively deviates from the imagery that the titles allude to; when he does not do so (such as in The Hut on Fowl's Legs) the results are one-dimensional and almost funny. The different figures that Rhode creates for the Promenades are very inspired, so are the different setups for Limoges, Tuileries and the Ballet of Unhatched Chicks. The final video for Great Gate of Kiev of a piano being drowned in a dock in Bergen is awe-inspiring, almost threatening to turn the cycle's apotheosis into mere background music.
Think of the whole thing as an updated opera staging, whose very creativity might put off the more conservative audiences. While the project is apparently meant to make Mussorgsky's work more accessible for younger audiences, much of it relies on abstraction, which I think will narrow the audience down even further. This being said, Pictures Reframed is indeed an excellent rethinking of Mussorgsky's composition.
The main challenge in all performances is to make Andsnes's playing match the images being projected. It is a very difficult task, considering that performers can't give the exact same performance everytime. This is fully explained in the feature documentary, which follows the development of the project from its very first steps to the first performance at the Risor Festival. Other than focusing on the project, we are also presented with a brief summary of Andsnes's career as the pianist arrives in different cities. Both Adsnes and Rhode emerge as creative, funny and sympathetic characters. Although the documentary is by itself beautifully made and quite touching, the narration sounds somewhat reality-TV-ish. It ends up making Rhode sound like a musical philistine and Andsnes seem like he's not entirely happy with the final results.
The printed images in the book range from stunning to looking like DVD captures. Other than the color prints (which are all on the DVD of course), the book itself gives only the tracklisting, Leif Ove Adnsnes's view on Mussorgsky's music and Robin Rhode's texts explaining his individual images for each movement of Pictures at an Exhibition. Nothing is given on the composition history of Mussorgsky's (and Schumann's) pieces. That comes either in the CD release, or via Internet access with a code provided in the book. What can I say, even deluxe editions aren't that complete. In short, despite minor flaws, this edition definitely gives musically strong performances and a refreshing view on the performance of familiar classical repertoire in our times.