During World War Two, super-villainous Johann Schmidt (Hugo Weaving) steamrolls into a Norwegian town in search of the mythical Tesseract, while in Brooklyn, ‘Skinny’ Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) is refused enlistment in the war. Rogers’s grit nonetheless attracts the attention of Dr Abraham Erskine (Stanley Tucci) and he is enrolled in Project: Rebirth under Howard Stark (Dominic Cooper) and becomes the recipient of the super soldier serum. When his rogue rescue mission discovers Schmidt’s deep science felons Hydra channelling the Tesseract into experimental weaponry, Rogers is armed by Stark with a Vibranium shield, and Captain America fights his way through the war. Directed by Joe Johnston, The First Avenger is rooted in Captain America Comics #1, published in 1941 by Marvel’s predecessor Timely Comics.
During the exhibition ‘Marvel: Creating the Cinematic Universe’, the Gallery of Modern Art’s Australian Cinémathèque screens all the films from the Marvel Cinematic Universe including Captain America: The First Avenger 2011. This is a great opportunity to see the films which have inspired the exhibition and see never-before-seen set pieces.
‘So, what made you so special?’
‘Nothing. I’m just a kid from Brooklyn.’
Johann Schmidt and Steve Rogers
DELVE DEEPER INTO THE EXHIBITION AND THE MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE
Go behind the scenes to experience more than 500 unique objects from your favourite films, including Captain America’s shield, and iconic objects which offer a glimpse into the work of production designers, storyboarding and pre‑visualisation artists, costume and prop designers, and visual effects artists alongside the original comic books which introduced the characters and influenced the films.
Director Kenneth Branagh brings gravitas to the mythical aspect of the Cinematic Universe with Thor, wielder of the star-forged hammer Mjolnir and heir to the realm of Asgard. When his coronation is interrupted by the return of the Frost Giants, Thor (Chris Hemsworth) defies his father, Odin (Anthony Hopkins), by breaking peace with their realm. For this, Odin strips Thor of his power and banishes him to Earth where he is struck by the charm, and the vehicle, of astrophysicist Jane Foster (Natalie Portman).
When Thor is arrested by the ever-vigilant S.H.I.E.L.D., Foster’s mentor Dr Erik Selvig (Stellan Skarsgård) frees him to fend off the magically animated armour dispatched by his endlessly scheming brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston). In the closing credits scene, Nick Fury reveals the Tesseract to Selvig, introducing the first of the Infinity Stones, objects central to the unfolding Universe and to Loki’s scheming.
During the exhibition ‘Marvel: Creating the Cinematic Universe’, the Gallery of Modern Art’s Australian Cinémathèque screens all the films from the Marvel Cinematic Universe including Thor 2011. This is a great opportunity to see the films which have inspired the exhibition and see never-before-seen set pieces.
‘Your ancestors called it magic, and you call it science. Well, I come from a land where they are one and the same thing.’
Thor to Jane Foster
DELVE DEEPER INTO THE EXHIBITION AND THE MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE
Go behind the scenes to experience more than 500 unique objects from your favourite films, including Thor’s hammer, set pieces from the highly anticipated Thor: Ragnarok 2017, and iconic objects which offer a glimpse into the work of production designers, storyboarding and pre‑visualisation artists, costume and prop designers, and visual effects artists alongside the original comic books which introduced the characters and influenced the films.
Installation view of the majestic Asgardian throne room from the upcoming Marvel film Thor: Ragnarok 2017, ‘Marvel: Creating the Cinematic Universe’, GOMA 2017
Tony Stark’s bombastic entry to his own technology expo conceals the damaged human beneath the surface: the very science keeping him alive is leeching toxic substances into his blood. Hiding his ailing health and handing his company over to Pepper Potts, Tony’s mortality gets the better of him when he subs in as a driver in the Monaco Grand Prix and comes into the sights of electric whip-wielding, ex-con, physicist Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke).
‘It would appear that the same thing that is keeping you alive is also killing you, sir.’ Jarvis to Tony Stark
Vanko’s vendetta against Stark Industries sees him scheme with arms dealer Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) to turn an army of combat suits into destructive drones to secure government contracts. Tony’s new assistant Natalie Rushman (Scarlett Johansson), revealed as S.H.I.E.L.D. operative Natasha Romanoff, goes into black ops mode as Stark and Rhodey (Don Cheadle, replacing Terrence Howard from the first Iron Man) light up the sky in a desperate battle against the Vanko-hacked drones. Directed by Jon Favreau.
Experience more than 500 unique objects from your favourite films, including Iron Man’s suit of armour, and iconic objects which offer a glimpse into the work of production designers, storyboarding and pre‑visualisation artists, costume and prop designers, and visual effects artists alongside the original comic books which introduced the characters and influenced the films.
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Gamma-radiated Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) lays low in Brazil, avoiding the elevated heart rate that transforms him into the mighty green Hulk. With designs on the radiation’s military potential, US General Thaddeus Ross (William Hurt) dispatches Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth), an ageing British Marine hopped up on a small dose of Super Solider serum, to locate and subdue Banner. When Blonsky manages to steal some of Banner’s blood plasma, he becomes the Abomination, a villain first seen in Tales to Astonish #90 in 1967, and only the Hulk can thwart him. After this film, directed by Louis Leterrier, Banner and the Hulk won’t be seen again until Mark Ruffalo assumes the role in Marvel’s The Avengers 2012.
During the exhibition ‘Marvel: Creating the Cinematic Universe’, the Gallery of Modern Art’s Australian Cinémathèque screens all the films from the Marvel Cinematic Universe including The Incredible Hulk 2008. This is a great opportunity to see the films which have inspired the exhibition.
‘I don’t want to control it. I want to get rid of it.’
Bruce Banner
DELVE DEEPER INTO THE EXHIBITION AND THE MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE
After the film go behind the scenes and experience more than 500 artworks from Marvel’s archives and private collections which offer a glimpse into the work of production designers, storyboarding and pre‑visualisation artists, costume and prop designers, and visual effects artists with iconic objects alongside the original comic books which introduced the characters and influenced the films.
See the props from your favourite film. During the exhibition ‘Marvel: Creating the Cinematic Universe’, the Gallery of Modern Art’s Australian Cinémathèque screens all the films from the Marvel Cinematic Universe including Iron Man 2008. This is a great opportunity to see the films which have inspired the exhibition.
The tone for the Marvel Cinematic Universe was set with the astute casting of Robert Downey Jr as genius-billionaire–playboy–philanthropist Tony Stark in director Jon Favreau’s opening entry in the series. First created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby for 1963’s Tales of Suspense #39, Stark dons the high-tech Iron Man armour to escape a foreign prison. The film balances parachuting Stark, the conflicted arms manufacturer, into modern geopolitics with a self-awareness of its comic origins.
‘I know that it’s confusing. It is one thing to question the official story, and another thing entirely to make wild accusations, or insinuate that I’m a Super Hero.’
‘I never said you were a Super Hero.’
Tony Stark and reporter Christine Everhart
When Tony’s business partner Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges) attempts to harness the Iron Man suit, ‘a masterpiece of death’, for pain and profit, it is up to a newly moral Stark to bring him down. Complicated legacies, escalating aggression and balancing humanity with extraordinary powers are established as themes for the whole Universe. For Stark, there is also the Tin Man’s search for a heart, symbolised by the Arc Reactor in his chest keeping him alive.
DELVE DEEPER INTO THE EXHIBITION AND THE MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE
After the film go behind the scenes and experience more than 500 artworks from Marvel’s archives and private collections which offer a glimpse into the work of production designers, storyboarding and pre‑visualisation artists, costume and prop designers, and visual effects artists with iconic objects alongside the original comic books which introduced the characters and influenced the films.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a single continuity of feature films and other media based on characters and stories from Marvel’s sprawling comic book history, released in ‘phases’. Though each film is self-contained, their thematic threads, recurring characters and subplots create a deep interconnectedness, which invites fans to identify hidden links and speculate feverishly on how the next chapters will unfold. Accessible to a wide audience thanks to canny casting, keen humour and a willingness to push the limits of genre, MCU films have enjoyed both critical and popular success.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) — explored in detail through QAGOMA’s major winter exhibition — boasts intricate, intertwined stories in 15 films to date. Delve into the MCU and its stories and characters.
Following the success of its first film, 2008’s Iron Man, the MCU expanded rapidly to become one of the most successful contemporary cinema properties, which gave the studio confidence to take risks, such as putting the lesser-known cosmic adventurers from Guardians of the Galaxy alongside top-tier heroes like Iron Man and Thor. Marvel also cleverly heightens anticipation for each adventure — fans know to sit through the closing credits for amusing interludes that sow the seeds for upcoming stories.
In addition to bringing in A-list actors to play its mentors and villains (among them Sir Anthony Hopkins, Robert Redford, Mickey Rourke and Tilda Swinton), Marvel gives directing duties to filmmakers of singular vision. Kenneth Branagh’s Shakespearean approach elevated the first Thor; brothers Anthony and Joe Russo were best known for episodes of comedies Arrested Development and Community before delivering the taut thrills of Captain America: The Winter Solider; and New Zealand’s Taika Waititi directed the upcoming Thor: Ragnarok on the strength of low-budget comedies, such as the multiple award-winning Hunt for the Wilderpeople 2016.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe translates the comic book experience into the cinematic realm. Currently scheduled in a series of three narrative chapters, or phases, the films distil years of storytelling into an interconnected narrative, with each film expanding to include new characters and frontiers.
Phase One begins with Iron Man introducing the brilliant but troubled arms magnate Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr), whose technological talents allow him to fight terror as the titular metal-suited hero. The Incredible Hulk sees another haunted genius, the gamma-radiated Dr Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) face his demons. Iron Man 2 brings the wide-reaching, extra-governmental intelligence agency S.H.I.E.L.D. (Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division) into play, with its director Nick Fury (Samuel L Jackson) and undercover agent Natasha ‘Black Widow’ Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson). Inspired by Norse mythology, Thor (Chris Hemsworth), the hammer-wielding God of Thunder, is banished to Earth where he finds himself at odds with his scheming adopted brother, Loki (Tom Hiddleston). In Captain America: The First Avenger, set during World War Two, Chris Evans plays Steve Rogers — a big-hearted Brooklyn kid transformed into a super solider by the experiments of Howard Stark (Tony’s father and founder of S.H.I.E.L.D.). We are also introduced to the Infinity Stones — powerful gems that can manipulate certain domains of reality. One of them, the blue Space Stone contained within the Tesseract, is the object of the villains’ desires in Phase One’s culminating film, Marvel’s The Avengers. Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) directed the first full team-up, in which Fury assembles Stark, Banner (now played by Mark Ruffalo), Romanoff, Thor, a cryogenically preserved Rogers, and marksman Clint ‘Hawkeye’ Barton (Jeremy Renner) to face off against the nefarious Loki and a swarming alien army in a climactic battle for New York.
Phase Two finds our heroes coping with the fallout of New York, and reveals the machinations of mad titan Thanos as he schemes to collect the Infinity Stones. Stark confronts his own mortality and morality in Iron Man 3, while Thor is forced to ally with Loki to save Asgard in Thor: The Dark World.Captain America: The Winter Soldier takes cues from 1970s spy thrillers, sending Rogers and Romanoff on the run to uncover a menacing conspiracy within S.H.I.E.L.D.
Phase Two also introduces the Guardians of the Galaxy — a pan-galactic sci-fi branch of the MCU that brings together a new motley of heroes: half-human Peter ‘Star-Lord’ Quill (Chris Pratt), the raccoon-like Rocket (Bradley Cooper), sentient tree Groot (Vin Diesel), literal-minded Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista), and Gamora (Zoe Saldana), the adopted daughter of Thanos (Josh Brolin).
In Avengers: Age of Ultron, the earth-bound Avengers reunite when Tony Stark accidentally animates the malevolent artificial intelligence Ultron (James Spader), whom they can defeat only in a destructive confrontation, with help from psychic Wanda ‘Scarlet Witch’ Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) and Vision (Paul Bettany), the benevolent Infinity Stone-powered AI. Phase Two closes with a dimensional detour, when former cat burglar Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) takes on the mantle of miniaturised hero Ant-Man.
In the chaotic wake of Age of Ultron, Phase Three opens with Captain America:Civil War, which splits the heroes into two groups: a Tony Stark-led faction that supports the global push for regulation of the Avengers, and a Steve Rogers-fronted bloc that opposes them. The film introduces African king and warrior T’Challa, aka Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman), and friendly neighbourhood web-slinger Peter Parker (Tom Holland) — Spider-Man’s first MCU appearance. Mystical dimensions are introduced when Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch), a self-absorbed but brilliant surgeon, seeks supernatural healing after his hands are irreparably damaged. Under the tutelage of the Ancient One (Tilda Swinton), he finds himself on a path to a new magical mastery aided by an Infinity Stone that can manipulate time.
In 2017, Phase Three continues with Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2; Peter Parker’s first MCU standalone film, Spider-Man:Homecoming; and the highly anticipated Thor:Ragnarok, which was filmed in Queensland and Brisbane’s CBD. The MCU is set to expand even further in 2018: after a solo outing for BlackPanther, virtually every hero seen on screen so far, as well as Captain Marvel (Brie Larson), will join the fray in the massive Avengers:Infinity War. By the time the Infinity Stones story wraps up in 2019 with a fourth Avengers film, the Marvel Cinematic Universe will comprise 21 intertwined big-screen adventures.
DELVE DEEPER INTO THE EXHIBITION AND THE MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE
‘Marvel: Creating the Cinematic Universe’ is organised by the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) in collaboration with Marvel Entertainment. The exhibition has received additional support from the Queensland Government though Tourism and Events Queensland (TEQ) and Arts Queensland.
We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the land on which the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art stands and recognise the creative contribution First Australians make to the art and culture of this country.
