A documentarian strikes up an odd friendship with reclusive 80 year old outsider artist Al Carbee, whose strange Barbie-doll photography gains acclaim and interest over the course of the project's multi-year history. Far beyond a portrait of an eccentric, Magical Universe is about wonder, friendship, and the transcendent power of creativity
Secrets of the Ghent Altarpiece (2019)
A documentary about the "The Mystic Lamb" painted at the beginning of the 15th century by the Van Eyck brothers.
Troublemakers: The Story of Land Art (2015)
The titular troublemakers are the New York–based Land (aka Earth) artists of the 1960s and 70s, who walked away from the reproducible and the commodifiable, migrated to the American Southwest, worked with earth and light and seemingly limitless space, and rethought the question of scale and the relationships between artist, landscape, and viewer. Director James Crump has meticulously constructed Troublemakers from interviews (with Germano Celant, Virginia Dwan, and others), photos and footage of Walter De Maria, Michael Heizer, Robert Smithson, Nancy Holt, and Charles Ross among others at work on their astonishing creations.
No Ideas But in Things - the composer Alvin Lucier (2012)
“Don’t ask me what I mean, ask me what I’ve made” – inspired by this motto, the documentary accompanies the American composer Alvin Lucier (1931 - 2021) on concert travels to The Hague (Netherlands) and Zug (Switzerland). Lucier explains and comments on his œuvre – from his early live electronics performances (MUSIC FOR SOLO PERFORMER,1965 and BIRD AND PERSON DYNING, 1975) up to the premiere of his ensemble piece PANORAMA 2 in 2011. One of Lucier’s key works, I AM SITTING IN A ROOM (1969), is introduced as a central structuring device in the film. At home in Middletown, Connecticut, Lucier offers rare insights into the beginnings of his pioneering works, his time as a member of the Sonic Arts Union, his relations with John Cage and David Tudor, as well as his teaching practice at Wesleyan University.
Vermeer Master of Light (2001)
Vermeer: Master of Light, is a visual quest in search of what makes a Vermeer a Vermeer. It is a journey of discovery, guiding the viewer through an exploration of Vermeers paintings and examining the secrets of his technique.
Giovanni Segantini - Magie des Lichts (2015)
Artist, anarchist, drop-out, paperless immigrant: Giovanni Segantini was all of this. He created, usually under the open sky, monumental, idealized alpine landscapes. In the course of his lifetime, he climbed ever higher in search of more light, finally dying at 41 in an Engadin alpine hut at 2700m. The film offers insight into his difficult childhood and boyhood, shares his inner processes and crises as a painter, as well as his contradictory dealings with motherly love and eroticism – and ultimately his desperate struggle against death…
The World of Dong Kingman (1953)
James Wong Howe follows artist Dong Kingman over the course of a day, in which the maestro starts and finishes a watercolor of a street in New York City.
Golan: A Farewell to Mr Cinema (2015)
The final documentary in Christopher Sykes’ trilogy about legendary Palestinian-born Israeli movie director, producer, and studio mogul Menahem Golan looks back to the prolific filmmaker’s great Hollywood days, then forward to reveal a man who, in his eighties, still buzzes with energy, talking lovingly about what inspires him as he anticipates making a new blockbuster and receiving the Oscar he’s always wanted. - Denver Film Society
Closeness to the Land (2022)
In 2020, just as the pandemic was beginning, Gazala purchased land in western Ohio, on which sits a disused school building. This site allowed her to explore her complex relationship with “the land.” As the daughter of displaced indigenous Palestinians, she attempts to form a proxy bond with the earth, on ground that was stolen from the displaced indigenous Shawnee people. Closeness to the Land is video footage of hand-painted text signs that translate the word الأرض (ard) into six English words, displayed performatively in multiple locations to capture the now-invisible nature of indigenous culture in Ohio. These signs were installed on the old schoolhouse in early 2021.
Cloud Cult - Arts in Nature Festival (2013)
Recorded Live on August 11, 2013, KEXP and Nature Consortium presents Cloud Cult performing at Camp Long during the 15th Arts in Nature Festival.
Cesar's Grill (2013)
In order to rescue his father's ramshackle grill restaurant, filmmaker and vegetarian Dario Aguirre is traveling back to his homeland Ecuador. What starts out as a strange debate about opening times, chips and Excel spread sheets, develops into a moving family drama.
Edward Hopper (1981)
A film based on a search undertaken by filmmaker Ron Peck into the life and work of the painter Edward Hopper.
The Artist and the Computer (1976)
Pioneering artist Lillian Schwartz demonstrates the human input -- integrity, artistic sensibilities, and aesthetics -- that goes into producing early computer art. In voice-over she explains the intent behind a number of her films and offers insight into the artist's problems and decisions. Produced for AT&T.
Old Age Porn (1970)
On a search for a couple for a love story with sex beyond the 70 Herbert Götzinger sent me to his colleagues sculptor Ludwig Chateau. During my surprise visit with the running camera, asking if he would be willing to do his part, he attacked me: "Is not that enough what they're doing at this moment?" –LM
Solitary Eyes (2023)
An isolated filmmaker struggles to connect with others in the absence of cameras. When he becomes creatively stuck, the world around him begins to dissolve.
Ai Weiwei: Without Fear or Favour (2010)
Arts documentary, first broadcast before Ai Weiwei's arrest by the Chinese authorities in April 2011, and his subsequent release after being detained for 11 weeks. Architect, photographer, curator and blogger, Ai Weiwei is China's most famous and politically outspoken contemporary artist. Alan Yentob explores the story of Ai Weiwei's life and art, and reveals how this most courageous and determined of artists continues to fight for artistic freedom of expression while living under the restrictive shadows of authoritarian rule.
Kusama's Self-Obliteration (1967)
A film exploration of the work and aesthetic concepts of Yayoi Kusama, painter, sculptor, and environmentalist, conceived in terms of an intense emotional experience with metaphysical overtones, an extension of my ultimate interest in a total fusion of the arts in a spirit of mutual collaboration. —Jud Yalkut