Art invigorates our lives, often making our vivid imaginations into something tangible and real. Art has the capacity to heal, enlighten, and inspire. For the creators of art, the internal calling to express themselves through their work can be insatiable to the point of being torturous. The yin and yang of artistic expression is explored in this moving documentary from director Benjamin Ree.
The Painter and the Thief follows Czech painter Barbora Kysilkova as she desperately searches for answers following the theft of two of her expensive and sentimental works. When one of the thieves, Karl-Bertil Nordland, is caught and put on trial, Barbora befriends him and invites him to sit for a portrait after feeling an urge to paint her tormentor. During the process, the two form an improbable relationship and an inextricable bond that will forever link them.
There is a duality to art that gives it the capacity to not only satisfy and even heal human beings, but also eat away at our being as the urge to create often times consumes the artist, a reality that fuels The Painter and the Thief. In the documentary, we see that Barbora sometimes paints to heal herself, it is how she deals with Bertil’s transgression against her and her decision to forgive him, after all. But as the story pushes forward, we also see that her creativity as an artist is fueled in part through surrounding herself with chaos. This push and pull makes it so that what heals her and helping her cope is also what’s harming her in the first place. This bittersweet duality can often be seen in various parts of the human experience, such as a love that hurts us as much as it soothes, but is especially the experience of many a creative with an internal drive pushing them to develop works of art that simultaneously pushes them to the brink of self-destruction. Through Barbora’s journey in The Painter and the Thief, we see the agony of what it means to be driven to compulsorily love what harms you.
Despite the Sophie’s choice resulting from being an obsessive artist, art in general is a boon upon our lives more than albatross. It can be therapeutic for all who consume it. This is clearly the case for Bertil, who begins The Painter and the Thief as a bit of an irredeemable character who begins a path toward redemption through his participation in the artistic process with a person he has wronged. When Bertil first sees the portrait of himself painted by Barbora, we are able to witness his emotion from truly feeling seen for the first time. Through his friendship with Barbora, Bertil finally begins to feel like something more than a burden or a screwup, setting him upon a path toward redemption. Art often allows us to see reflections of ourselves and not only the parts of which we are aware, but the opportunity to see ourselves in ways we didn’t previously realize was possible. This fact fuels a lot of the modern push for greater representation in entertainment, aware from decades long archetypes and toward diverse depictions of groups not often seen. Proponents of this shift point to how the trajectory of the lives of underrepresented youth can be impacted simply from seeing images of themselves in places where they are not normally seen, Bertil’s reaction to his portrait reinforces this theory. And does this theory not contain some plausibility? What are dreams but latent desires sparked by sights and sounds presented to us that spark the imagination within? We often don’t look to the stars until some unexpected force or innovation guides our eyes in that direction; artistic creation is often the impetus that inspires us to look for something greater.
Apart from its statement on art, this document explores forgiveness and our capacity to see past people’s mistakes, no matter how chronic they may be. Bertil is a long-time drug addict with a propensity for making big mistakes, but the only person outside of his father who is able to still glimpse at a piece of his humanity is a woman from whom he stole art with a five figure price tag but an even heftier amount of sentimentality. As the United States finds itself in the midst of a now decades long opioid use epidemic, the question of how we forgive those that harm others in service of their disease will become evermore relevant. Through The Painter and the Thief, a light at the end of the tunnel can be seen, showing that some people may always be reached through unconditional compassion and caring over time.
Director Benjamin Ree manages to make a remarkably cinematic feeling documentary that often flows and feels more like a film than a real-life portrait of non-actors. Ree and Kristoffer Kumar’s cinematography, along with Robert Stengеrd’s editing wed the best of documentary and narrative filmmaking, to create a work that is both engaging and informative for the world in which we inhabit. This is also a testament to the access agreed to by Barbora Kysilkova and Karl-Bertil Nordland providing us with extensive access to their lives. It all comes together to paint a portrait of the power of both art and forgiveness.
Image: NEON
