Childhood in Art

Nude men in rubber suits, close-ups of erections, objects shoved in the most intimate of places—these are photographs taken by Robert Mapplethorpe, known by many as the most controversial photographer of the twentieth century. Openly gay, Mapplethorpe took images of male sex, nudity, and fetish to extremes that resulted in his work still being labelled by some as pornography masquerading as art. But less talked about are the more serene, yet striking portraits of flowers, sculptures, and perfectly framed human forms that are equally pioneering and powerful.

This candid New York love story explores the chaotic 40-year marriage of famed boxing painter Ushio Shinohara and his wife, Noriko. Anxious to shed her role as her overbearing husband's assistant, Noriko finds an identity of her own.

This searing investigative work shadows a group of activists risking unimaginable peril to confront the ongoing anti-LGBTQ program raging in the repressive and closed Russian republic. Unfettered access and a remarkable approach to protecting anonymity exposes this under-reported atrocity–and an extraordinary group of people confronting evil.

A visual montage portrait of our contemporary world dominated by globalized technology and violence.

The world's greatest pin-up model and cult icon, Bettie Page, recounts the true story of how her free expression overcame government witch-hunts to help launch America's sexual revolution. When she saw the film The Notorious Bettie Page, produced by HBO in 2006, the main person concerned reacted unequivocally: “Lies! Lies!” In a long interview recorded shortly before her death, the woman who entered the collective unconscious as the ultimate pin-up gave her version of events to director Mark Mori. In a gravelly voice, Bettie Page tells her own story and lifts the veil on areas often hidden by images that have made so many men and women fantasize since the 1950s: her abused childhood, an eclipse that lasted forty years, her mental illness. Through testimonies and unpublished archives, this documentary brings back to life a body and a face endlessly declined before our eyes, just as Bettie wanted: “I would like people to remember me as I was in the photos.”

Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.

A compilation of over 30 years of private home movie footage shot by Lithuanian-American avant-garde director Jonas Mekas, assembled by Mekas "purely by chance", without concern for chronological order.

Nine filmmakers each profile a young girl from a different part of the world to weave a global tapestry of youth in the 21st century.

This unique cinematic experience dives deep into an artist’s work and reveals his life path, inspiration, and creative process. It explores his fascination with myth and history. Past and present are interwoven to diffuse the line between film and painting, allowing the audience to be completely immersed in the remarkable world of one of the greatest contemporary artists, Anselm Kiefer. Wim Wenders shot this unique portrait over the course of two years in stunning 3D.

The life and career of one of comedy's most inimitable modern voices, Mr. Gilbert Gottfried.

As his life comes to its end, famous Hollywood director Orson Welles puts it all on the line at the chance for renewed success with the film The Other Side of the Wind.

An account of the life and work of Swiss painter, sculptor, architect and designer H. R. Giger (1940-2014), tormented father of creatures as fearsome as they are fascinating, inhabitants of nightmarish biomechanical worlds.

An intimately raw and magical journey through the life, mind, and heart of iconic artist Frida Kahlo. Told through her own words for the very first time — drawn from her diary, revealing letters, essays, and print interviews — and brought vividly to life by lyrical animation inspired by her unforgettable artwork.

A paralysingly beautiful documentary with a global vision—an odyssey through landscape and time—that attempts to capture the essence of life.

In an intimate and joyful story of love in the face of loss, celebrated poets Andrea Gibson and Megan Falley find strength—and unexpected hilarity—in what might be their final year together.

Vivian Maier's photos were seemingly destined for obscurity, lost among the clutter of the countless objects she'd collected throughout her life. Instead these images have shaken the world of street photography and irrevocably changed the life of the man who brought them to the public eye. This film brings to life the interesting turns and travails of the improbable saga of John Maloof's discovery of Vivian Maier, unravelling this mysterious tale through her documentary films, photographs, odd collections and personal accounts from the people that knew her. What started as a blog to show her work quickly became a viral sensation in the photography world. Photos destined for the trash heap now line gallery exhibitions, a forthcoming book and this documentary film.

Featuring a wealth of previously unseen archive, this film looks at how Bowie continually evolved: from Ziggy Stardust to the Soul Star of Young Americans, to the ‘Thin White Duke’. It explores his regeneration in Berlin with the critically acclaimed album Heroes, his triumph with Scary Monsters and his global success with Let’s Dance. With interviews with all his closest collaborators, David Bowie - Five Years presents a unique account of why Bowie has become an ‘icon of our times’.

A portrait of Keith Richards that takes us on a journey to discover the genesis of his sound as a songwriter, guitarist and performer.

An intimate journey through the formative years of David Lynch's life. From his idyllic upbringing in small town America to the dark streets of Philadelphia, we follow Lynch as he traces the events that have helped to shape one of cinema's most enigmatic directors.

In the last five years of his life, David Bowie ended nearly a decade of silence to engage in an extraordinary burst of activity, producing two groundbreaking albums and a musical. David Bowie: The Last Five Years explores this unexpected end to a remarkable career. Made with remarkable access, Francis Whately’s documentary is a revelatory follow-up to his acclaimed 2013 documentary David Bowie: Five Years, which chronicled Bowie’s golden ‘70s and early-‘80s period.

Embark on the epic ride of Jim Phillips, the genius behind skateboarding and rock culture's electrifying art. Drawing inspiration from his life in Santa Cruz, CA, Jim helped shape the golden era of skateboarding. Jim's story is a profound narrative of resilience, passion, and enduring artistic vision. This documentary explores Jim's dynamic life and career, showcasing his iconic work that has defined an era and secured his place in modern art history.

The impact of Marx on the 20th century has been all-pervasive and world-wide. This program looks at the man, at the roots of his philosophy, at the causes and explanations of his philosophical development, and at its most direct outcome: the failed Soviet Union.

This fascinating exploration of the creative process follows one of Australia's leading contemporary artists Ben Quilty, as he completes one of his most challenging art works.

The history of art in Ethiopia. The film emphasizes the styles, materials, etc. ofpaintings on walls and roofs of ancient churche

In 1988, art student Damien Hirst and a group of like-minded associates mounted an exhibition in a building in the East End of London. Entitled Freeze, it was a huge critical and commercial success, propelling Hirst and the group into the spotlight of the avant-garde. More than five years later, Hirst exhibits to international acclaim and is regularly derided in the tabloid press. This portrait of Hirst, which resumes the Omnibus season, is presented as a drug-induced nightmare after Hirst has been put to sleep by a sinister dentist, played by Donald Pleasence. In between interviews with fellow Freeze artists including Angus Fairhurst , Sarah Lucas and Tracey Emin , Hirst is seen preparing Mother and Child Divided, his work for last year's Venice Blennale. The piece consists of a cow and a calf, each sawn in half, pickled in formaldehyde and exhibited in four tanks.

In the fall of 1987, Philippe Haas accompanied the sculptor Richard Long to the Algerian Sahara and filmed him tracing with his feet, or constructing with desert stones, simple geometric figures (straight lines, circles, spirals). In counterpoint to the images, Richard Long explains his approach. Since 1967, Richard Long (1945, Bristol), who belongs to the land art movement, has traveled the world on foot and installed, in places often inaccessible to the public, stones, sticks and driftwood found in situ. His ephemeral works are reproduced through photography. He thus made walking an art, and land art an aspiration of modern man for solitude in nature.

Contemporary artist Koki Tanaka sets up a booth at a Los Angeles flea market to sell palm fronds. "I tried to bring something very extreme into the flea-market context. I picked the palm fronds because they are the most useless things in California – they’re what we have to sweep away after a windy day. It was an experiment in registering people’s reaction to a fundamental question about the value of objects. And I was referencing two historical pieces: David Hammons’s Bliz-aard Ball Sale [1983], where he sold snowballs during winter in New York; and a Japanese manga called Munou no Hito [A Worthless Person, 1985], in which the protagonist sells stones by the riverside – stones being sold alongside stones. So both shared quite similar ideas." - Koki Tanaka

Move over, King Tut: There's a new pharaoh on the scene. A team of top archaeologists and forensics experts revisits the story of Hatshepsut, the woman who snatched the throne dressed as a man and declared herself ruler. Despite her long and prosperous reign, her record was all but eradicated from Egyptian history in a mystery that has long puzzled scholars. But with the latest research effort captured in this program, history is about to change.

Entertaining portrait of Erlend Štaub - a self-made professional photographer working at the president's annual reception, theatrical premieres, and film festivals like Black Nights and Cannes, and talking about life and everything in it.

For both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians, Captain James Cook is a figure of great historical significance.

The documentary is titled after Arkadaş Z. Özger’s poem “Hello My Dear” which had caused much controversy in the period it was first published. Considered to be in defiance of heteronormativity, the said poem includes references to the poet’s personality, his family, his relationship to the society, and his “unexpected” death, which came three years after its publication. Today, 50 years after it was written, the documentary follows these same lines in the poem utilising cinematic elements. The documentary also rediscovers the poetics; reaches out to the family, the comrades, the friendships, departing from the official historical accounts, cognizant of his experience of otherness, in pursuit of the “lost” portrait of Arkadaş Z. Özger.

A giant ball of gas and raw energy with a temperature of up to 15 million degrees, the sun is the origin of life on earth and influences an infinite number of natural phenomena. This documentary is dedicated to the search for the significance of our home star for mankind, science and nature. Researchers at the American Space Agency NASA, the Canary Islands observatories, and the hottest and coldest places on earth share their insights. We can expect an emotional journey through science and history, peppered with human stories, at the end of which the complex bandwidth of life is revealed. Never before in the history of mankind has it been more important to uncover the secrets of the sun. Because for our earth, the sun is not just any star. It is the ultimate star.

By drawing a parallel between the Indian Durga Puja festival and other forms of celebrating the divine feminine, Santa Shakti reveals the Sacred Power beyond languages and religions.

From the legendary times of Romulus and Remus to the present day, the compelling story of the eternal city's twenty-five centuries of civilization traces the rise of Christianity over paganism through studies of Vatican art treasures.

A self-narrated portrait of a Polish immigrant in Winnipeg whose unglamorous job keeping streetcar switches working reveals dignity, resilience, and pride in everyday labor.

The Finnish modern dancer Noora Hannula dances through this documentary film in her own explosive style. Noora’s life has always been very connected to the artist environment with her grandfather, Simo Hannula, who throughout his entire life dedicated him fully to his art. Noora and her grandfather crossed paths when Noora used a picture of his dead body in her show and now we meet Noora working on her newest show: The Era of No Talent Rising, while she is trying to figure out where her own limits are.