GET 35% OFF YOUR FIRST YEAR!

Limited time - use promo code: SPRING35 at checkout

Art & Culture

From artists exploring and celebrating one another across disciplines — great Spanish filmmaker Carlos Saura sees the cinematic in the innovative buildings of Renzo Piano, and Alain Resnais' short films on Paul Gauguin, Van Gogh, and Pablo Picasso's GUERNICA -- to films on erotic poetry and daily life, and the lives of celebrated opera singers in retirement, these are collections of films by and about people who see culture not as some convenient place of escape from uncomfortable realities, but at the very epicenter of urgent human concerns,

Share
  • Pollock & Pollock

    Directed by Isabelle Rèbre • Documentary • With Sylvia Winter Pollock, Francesca McCoy Pollock, James McCoy, Helen Harrison, Peter Namuth, Terence Maloon, Dominic Gould, Rebecca Pauly, • 2020 • 82 minutes

    The film tells the story of two brothers, two American painters: Jackson Pollock and Charle...

  • The Booksellers

    Directed by D.W. Young • Documentary • With Fran Lebowitz, Parker Posey • 2020 • 98 minutes

    Antiquarian booksellers are part scholar, part detective and part businessperson, and their personalities and knowledge are as broad as the material they handle. They also play an underappreciated yet ess...

  • Seraphine (Martin Provost)

    Directed by Martin Provost • Drama • With Yolande Moreau, Ulrich Tukur • 2009 • 125 minutes

    Séraphine is the true story of Seraphine Louis aka Séraphine de Senlis (Yolande Moreau), a simple and profoundly devout housekeeper who in 1905 at age 41 — self-taught and with the instigation of her guar...

  • The Last Angel of History (John Akomfrah)

    Directed by John Akomfrah • Documentary • 1996 • 45 minutes

    John Akomfrah, director of Seven Songs of Malcolm X, returns with an engaging and searing examination of the hitherto unexplored relationships between Pan-African culture, science fiction, intergalactic travel, and rapidly progressing c...

  • Sol LeWitt

    Directed by Chris Teerink • Documentary • 2012 • 72 minutes

    'Conceptual artists leap to conclusions logic cannot reach,' Sol LeWitt (1928-2007) said in a rare audio-interview from 1974. Notoriously camera-shy, Lewitt refused awards and rarely granted interviews, yet in Chris Teerink's sensitive ...

  • Dance (collection)

    34 items

  • Music (collection)

    78 items

  • The Poets (collection)

    31 items

    "Poetry is the way we help give name to the nameless so it can be thought.”—Audre Lorde

    Poetry can be a groundswell for bold ideas. This curated collection will expose you to work ranging from Marlon Rigg’s “Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien (No Regret),” which illuminates the difficult journey of livin...

  • Photography (collection)

    27 items

    A growing collection of moving images about still images, and the people who take them.

  • Television (collection)

    24 items

    The history and practice of making television, watching it, thinking about it, and trying to change it.

  • Theater (collection)

    30 items

  • Visual Arts (collection)

    69 items

  • Mona Lisa is Missing

    Directed by Joe Medeiros • Documentary • 2013 • 86 minutes

    How did an unassuming housepainter from Italy pull off the greatest little known art heist in modern time? Was his motivation more than money?

    Writer-director Joe Medeiros traces the path of Vincenzo Peruggia, charged with the 1911 thef...

  • Sapiens, the Birth of Art

    Directed by Pascal Goblot • Documentary • 2023 • 70 minutes

    For decades, it was believed that the beginnings of art had emerged in Europe, 20,000 years ago at Lascaux, then 36,000 years at Chauvet...Recent researches are shaking up our understanding of art.

    The art of prehistory is much richer ...

  • The Grand Masters of the Chauvet Cave

    Directed by Christian Tran • Documentary • 2015 • 52 minutes

    The paintings and drawings of the Chauvet cave – made 36,000 years ago and discovered 20 years ago in the south of France – are the oldest human artistic expression to date. Their strength and modernity changed radically all the ideas ...

  • Lomax the Songhunter

    Directed by Rogier Kappers • Documentary • 2005 • 95 minutes

    Alan Lomax (1915-2002) devoted his life to recording the world's folk tunes before they would permanently disappear with the rise of the modern music industry. In LOMAX THE SONGHUNTER filmmaker Rogier Kappers follows the route that Lom...

  • Edward Hopper

    Directed by Ron Peck • Documentary • 1981 • 47 minutes

    A study of the 20th century American painter's life and work.

  • The Silence of Mark Rothko

    Directed by Marjoleine Boonstra • Documentary • 2014 • 52 minutes

    'He wanted the viewer to step into the painting. What he aimed for was not a consumption of art, but a dialogue. He thought that art could transform the public.' -Annie Cohen-Solal, Mark Rothko biographer Painter Mark Rothko is be...

  • Contact (series)

    9 items

    What is the story behind the most famous iconic photos from around the world? A unique and fascinating journey into the contact sheets of world renowned photographers from Magnum, the legendary agency founded in 1947.

    Contact sheets are the first overview for the photographer of what he has capt...

  • Artists and Love (2 Seasons)

    2 seasons

    From Georgia O’Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz to Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, ARTISTS & LOVE delves into the tumultuous romantic and creative partnerships that shaped some of the towering figures of modern art. Over the course of two seasons, directors Stéphanie Colaux and Delphine Deloget chronicl...

  • Preserving Worlds (series)

    2 seasons

    Preserving Worlds is a documentary travelogue through aging and beloved virtual worlds. Join us as we explore dated chat environments, appreciate player-created art, and meet people working against obsolescence to keep the communities they care about alive and accessible. Virtual worlds are delic...

  • Jazz on Film (collection)

    12 items

    A selection of films that incorporate jazz into their story. Ranging from Shirley Clarke's The Connection, a play within a play within a jazz concert, to portraits of jazz musicians like Ornette Coleman and Marcus Miller, these films celebrate and appreciate the music art form.

  • Far Off Sounds (series)

    21 items

    Far Off Sounds is a documentary series that explores how people use, play, and connect with music around the world. Japanese noise artists, Ethiopian jazz musicians, cult leaders, heavy metal cruises and more. The show tells discreet, intimate stories, in the service of the larger, infinitely com...

  • Starring Picasso

    10 items

    Whether animated or experimental, these four films and one series with Pablo Picasso showcase his talent and personality often in surprising, unexpected ways.