Guy Maddin brings his childhood to the Winnipeg Art Gallery

But filmmaker Guy Maddin has one request, "Don't look under the bed. That's one thing we didn't get right. This has just been completed so it doesn't have the seven months worth of dust bunnies and old magazines and socks," he said. 

As part of the Winnipeg Now exhibit at the Winnipeg Art Gallery, Maddin recreated his own teenage bedroom. The one he inherited from his big brother and lived in from the time he was six till he turned 21.  

"I'm a filmmaker and I was invited to do something here at the WAG and I accepted instantly and then immediately became paralyzed with fear. I know how to approach movies, not all my movies are any good but I sorta know what they aspire to be at least. But I'm not an installation artist at all naturally, so I realized I had to start with something personal," Maddin explained to Information Radio host, Terry MacLeod. 

"My family of eight, a grandmother, an aunt, three siblings, mom and dad built this house, expanded it to baby boomer perfection when I was about four. Then everyone promptly started moving away or dying of old age until it was my mom and dad and me in this gigantic house," Maddin said. 

As a kid with much older siblings, Maddin inherited a lot of hand me downs and other belongings. He spent time digging through his own family's archaeology, trying to figure out what life had been like before he was born. 

Visitors to the gallery will see a magazine collection, Elvis album, tape recorder, and a map of Winnipeg that came with the room and stayed on the wall as long as he lived in it.  

As part of Nuit Blanche, there will also be a group of pyjama-clad teenage girls holding a séance in Maddin's bedroom set. An event he will be shooting on film as it unfolds.