New York, NY–The Museum of Modern Art’s 2022 Film Benefit honored Academy Award–winning director Guillermo del Toro on December 8. Chanel in partnership with MoMA celebrated Del Toro and his work on the fifteenth annual Film Benefit. Chanel has been a proud sponsor of The Museum of Modern Art’s annual Film Benefit since 2011 and has served as lead sponsor of film at MoMA since 2021.
“Guillermo del Toro has been a treasured member of the MoMA family for the last 30 years from the debut of Cronos in New Directors/New Films 1994 to our upcoming exhibition devoted to his latest masterwork, Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio,” said Rajendra Roy, MoMA’s Celeste Bartos Chief Curator of Film. “We can’t wait to honor the man who loves cinema with his whole heart in front of the Museum’s adoring film community.”
Del Toro has been nominated for six Academy Awards, winning the Best Director and Best Picture awards in 2018 for The Shape of Water (2017). Del Toro’s work has appeared in several of the Museum’s exhibitions, starting in 1994, when his first film, Cronos (1993), was selected for the annual New Directors/New Films festival. Since then, the Museum has screened The Shape of Water (2017) as a part of The Contenders 2017 and Nightmare Alley (2021) as a part of The Contenders 2021.
The gala featured a tribute to the director Jessica Chastain, Richard Jenkins, Finn Wolfhard and Gregory Mann.
Guests were treated to a preview of Guillermo Del Toro: Crafting Pinocchio, an exhibition that gives a behind-the-scenes look at the creative process behind del Toro’s new film, opening at MoMA on December 11 through April 15, 2023.The exhibition will provide visitors with a behind-the-scenes look at the creative process needed to realize Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio (2022).
Previous MoMA Film Benefit honorees include Penélope Cruz, George Clooney, Laura Dern, Martin Scorsese, Julianne Moore, Tom Hanks, Cate Blanchett, Alfonso Cuarón, Tilda Swinton, Quentin Tarantino, Pedro Almodóvar, Kathryn Bigelow, Tim Burton, and Baz Luhrmann.
The evening closed with a performance by Academy Award and Grammy winning artist, H.E.R.