Ken Adam exhibition to open at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences this month in LA, USA

The work of Ken Adam, who has earned five Academy Award® nominations and taken home two Oscar® statuettes in the Art Direction category, will be featured in a new exhibition at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences beginning May 9. Like all exhibitions at the Academy, "Moonraker, Strangelove and Other Celluloid Dreams: the Visionary Art of Ken Adam" will be free and open to the public.

Installed in both the Grand Lobby and Fourth Floor Galleries of the Academy, "Moonraker, Strangelove and Other Celluloid Dreams" will include original production design sketches, models and large format set photographs. The exhibition recently concluded successful runs at the Serpentine Gallery in London, the Frankfurt Filmmuseum and the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin.

Born Klaus Adam in Berlin in 1921 and emigrating to England in 1934, Ken Adam studied architecture at University College London and served a stint as an RAF fighter pilot in World War II. He began his film career in 1947 as a draftsman and rapidly graduated to the title of art director. In 1956, he earned his first Academy Award nomination for that year`s Best Picture winner "Around the World in 80 Days."

Adam`s designs, influenced by his background in architecture, have resulted in some of the most stylistically unique and memorable film sets of the last five decades. The war room from "Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb," the interior of Fort Knox in "Goldfinger" (1964), and the gadgetry and intimidating interiors of several other films in the James Bond series are but a few examples of the work for which he is admired. (Adam earned his third Academy Award nomination for the 1977 Bond feature, "The Spy Who Loved Me.") Throughout his assignments on the Bond films, Adam has been additionally responsible for the designs of the vehicles that are so integral to the films` plot lines.

In contrast to the clean modernism of the above-mentioned work, Adam has also designed lush period decor, efforts which have resulted in his winning two Academy Awards®, one for "Barry Lyndon" in 1975 and the other for "The Madness of King George" in 1994. The macabre world he designed for "Addams Family Values" (1993) was nominated as well. The film adaptation of the two-character stage play "Sleuth" (1972) and the ambitious period musical "Pennies from Heaven" (1981) are also among his credits.

"Moonraker, Strangelove and Other Celluloid Dreams: the Visionary Art of Ken Adam" will continue at the Academy through August 17. Gallery viewing hours are Tuesdays through Fridays, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and weekends, noon to 6 p.m. The Academy is located at 8949 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills. For more information, call 310-247-3600.

Thanks to Rumpole for the alert.

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