This article was originally published in 2021 and included 23 recommended documentaries, but has been updated with an additional 12 entries in September 2024.
This Netflix documentary series offers a look into the creative minds of influential designers across different fields. Created by former Wired editor Scott Dadich, the first season profiles renowned figures such as Nike shoe designer Tinker Hatfield and architect Bjarke Ingels, giving insight into their work and personal journeys.
Watch on: Netflix
Produced and directed by Gary Hustwitt, Helvetica looks into the world of typography, focusing on the iconic typeface and its impact on graphic design and visual culture. Through interviews with prominent designers, the film explores the creative decisions behind type usage and its influence on urban spaces and communication.
Watch on: Vimeo, Amazon Prime, Apple TV
Art and Craft follows Mark Landis, a notorious art forger who donates meticulous replicas to museums. As a registrar uncovers his decades-long deception, the film explores Landis’s struggle with schizophrenia and his journey for connection. The documentary discusses art, identity and the line between genius and madness.
Watch on: Plex, Amazon Prime
This documentary chronicles the life of Diane von Furstenberg, a fashion icon who built a multi-million dollar empire in a male-dominated industry. From her roots as the daughter of a Holocaust survivor to becoming a princess by marriage, the film explores her achievements and ever-lasting influence.
Watch on: Disney+
Directed by Kate Novack, this intimate portrayal of André Leon Talley shows his ascent from the Jim Crow South to his status as a fashion industry icon. It examines his ground-breaking roles at Women’s Wear Daily, W and Vogue, where he made history as the first African-American male creative director.
Finding Vivian Maier uncovers the enigmatic life of Vivian Maier, a nanny who secretly took over 100,000 photographs and was recognised posthumously as one of the greatest photographers of the 20th century. Directed by John Maloof and Charlie Siskel, the film reveals her talent through never-before-seen images and interviews with those who knew her.
Watch on: Apple TV, Amazon Prime
Iris Apfel’s bold style and vibrant personality have made her iconic in the New York fashion world for decades. Directed by Albert Maysles, this film spotlights the 93-year-old and captures her enduring influence and unique approach to fashion, celebrating her as a true champion of style.
Watch on: Apple TV
Through his photography columns in The New York Times, Bill Cunningham chronicled New York’s fashion scene and high-society events, featuring icons such as Anna Wintour and Tom Wolfe. This 2010 documentary provides a detailed view of Cunningham’s distinctive style and his personal world.
Watch on: Internet Archive, Amazon
This is a celebration of Brooklyn-born photographer Jamel Shabazz, who captured the early days of hip-hop and street style. Charlie Ahearn showcases Shabazz’s iconic images from Times Square and Fort Greene Park, revealing the rich stories behind them through interviews with Shabazz, Fred “Fab 5 Freddy” Brathwaite, and KRS-One.
Buy or rent: This website
This debut documentary by Amanda Kim explores the life and work of Nam June Paik, a pioneer of video art and avant-garde creativity. The film tells the story of Paik’s rise in the New York art scene and his predictions about the future of media, featuring archival footage, interviews with his peers and narration by Steven Yeun.
Watch on: BFI Player
Jon Nguyen explores the early life of legendary filmmaker David Lynch. The film explores Lynch’s upbringing in Montana and Idaho, his move to Philadelphia to pursue painting and the origins of his first feature film, Eraserhead.
Watch on: Amazon Prime
Malik Bendjelloul follows two South African fans, Stephen "Sugar" Segerman and Craig Bartholomew Strydom, as they investigate the rumoured death of American musician Sixto Rodriguez and seek to uncover his fate. Despite Rodriguez’s music failing to gain recognition in the USA, it achieved remarkable popularity in South Africa, leading to this quest to learn more about the artist.
Watch on: Amazon Prime, YouTube
This film celebrates the 100th anniversary of the Bauhaus movement in 2019, examining its profound impact on art, design and architecture. It reveals how Bauhaus redefined everyday objects and spaces as political statements, shaping modern spatial thinking and establishing a lasting legacy in contemporary design.
Watch on: Amazon Freevee , Apple TV
As an artist whose vision has consistently been far ahead of its time, this documentary gives brilliant insight into Yayoi Kusama’s personal life and creative process. Directed by Heather Lenz, it charts Kusama’s journey from a conservative Japanese upbringing to becoming an acclaimed artist in America during the 1960s.
Watch on: Hulu, Amazon Prime
Not just confined to a single documentary, our first recommendation is an entire series, with over ten titles available on iPlayer right now. Presented by the BBC’s former creative director Alan Yentob, each episode looks at some of the figures and concepts that have made waves in modern arts and culture. Episodes currently on iPlayer include profiles on David Hockney, Chris Ofili, Anish Kapoor and Barbara Hepworth, as well as a study on how the arts world fared in the pandemic.
Watch on: BBC iPlayer
In 2011, during the last few weeks of his exhibition at the Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall, Ai Weiwei became one of the art world’s biggest household names, as he was detained for his anti-CCP (Chinese Communist Party) artworks. This Sundance Jury Prize-winner chronicles the two years leading up to the event, and the cult following he has amassed in China.
Watch on: Amazon Prime
Filmed during his cubist era, director Henri-Georges Clouzot delves into Pablo Picasso’s studio and documents his creative process via stop-motion and time-lapse. While most of the works made in this film have since been lost to both history and destruction, three of them were exhibited in the Royal Academy last year.
Watch on: YouTube
In 1986, Tamra Davis, who would later make a name herself directing movies like Crossroads and Billy Madison, interviewed her friend Jean-Michel Basquiat: the Warhol-championed artist who, after his fatal heroin overdose two years later, has cultivated a lasting legacy. Soundtracked by Mike D and Ad-Rock from the Beastie Boys.
Watch on: Amazon Prime (US)
Andy Goldsworthy makes art with natural and perishable materials, such as mud, ice and leaves. This documentary chronicles how he manages to make sculptures, all around the world, before the ice melts, the mud drips down and the structures collapse.
Watch on: Apple TV
The Art of the Steal revolves around the controversial decision to break Dr Albert C. Barnes’ will, and move his prestigious post-Impressionist art collection – including works by Picasso, Renoir and Matisse – from Pennsylvania to Philadelphia. This film depicts the move as a sinister plot, conducted by his enemies while he was still alive.
Watch on: Amazon Prime
For director Corinna Belz, being granted access to the infamously secretive painter Gerhard Richter’s studio was a rare feat. It features both his perspective and the perspectives of the art world and the media at large – as well as an oddly-satisfying, squeegee-packed look into his creative process.
Watch on: Apple TV
The most contemporary title on our list, Black Art: In the Absence of Light explores and celebrates some of the biggest Black visual artists working today. Drawing inspiration from the landmark 1976 exhibition Two Centuries of Black American Art, director Sam Pollard has expertly curated interviews with scholars, historians, curators and artists, including the likes of Theaster Gates, Kerry James Marshall, Faith Ringgold, Amy Sherald and Carrie Mae Weems.
Watch on:Now TV, Amazon Prime
Magician duo Penn and Teller go into the mind of Tim Jenison, a digitally inclined graphic designer who often feels compelled to paint a Vermeer. So he did – inventing a mirror-based device to achieve the photorealism that Vermeer was most famous for. Over the next five years, he recreates Vermeer’s studio in its entirety.
Watch on: Amazon Prime
As the name suggests, this movie is about London’s flagship art gallery, the National Gallery, and how it’s become as much a visitor attraction as a protective preserver of Turners, Rembrandts and Caravaggios – despite its staunch refusal to be used as a billboard for Sport Relief.
Watch on: Amazon Prime
From science to comedy, this documentary shines a spotlight on the creative mind and its process. Quick-paced and full of humour, it explores the habits and neuroses that “lead to breakthrough ideas” – across both artistic and non-artistic disciplines.
Watch on:
Amazon Prime (US)
Eight years after his untimely passing on New Year's Eve 1994, this documentary, directed by iconic video artist Charles Atlas, focuses on the life and legacy of Australian-born performance art pioneer (and sometimes Lucien Freud model) Leigh Bowery. The documentary also features interviews with his assistant-turned-wife, Nicola, and Boy George, who was creating a musical of his life, Taboo, at the time.
Watch on: YouTube
Kehinde Wiley was famously chosen to paint an official portrait of Barack Obama in 2018, but this film was released a few years earlier, and highlights the artist’s exuberant works that often portray Black subjects in the style of classical portraiture.
Wach on: Amazon Prime (US)
You can’t downplay Banksy’s presence, achievements and, of course, mystery. After a street-art fanatic named Thierry Guetta tried to make a movie about him, he, in true Banksy fashion, turned the tables and made a movie about Thierry instead. Narrated by Rhys Ifans, Banksy puts his personal touch on documenting Thierry’s eventual personal rise into street-art celebrity.
Watch on: Amazon Prime
A year later, Banksy returned to direct an hour-long documentary for Channel 4, about pranksters like him. This time narrated by Kathy Burke, the film profiles people such as Michael Fagan, who broke into the Queen’s bedroom, and YouTube flashmob pioneers Rémi Gaillard and Charlie Todd, the latter of which started the annual No Pants Subway Rides event that went viral in the late 2000s.
Watch on: Amazon Prime (US)
Jeff Bridges narrates this documentary about how the Ferus Gallery, which operated for nine years in the 50s and 60s, made post-war LA fall in love with art. Such names profiled in the movie include the gallery’s founder Walter Hopps, Irving Blum, who directed the gallery for most of its lifetime, and artists like Ed Ruscha and Wallace Berman.
Watch on: YouTube
Having risen to fame after his pyrotechnic display at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang and his artwork Sky Ladder are the subject for this documentary by Kevin Macdonald. Not only exploring his journey and artworks, it also takes a look at his complicated relationship with the Chinese state.
Watch on: Netflix
Tracking the feminist art movement and its impact since the 1960s, this documentary takes shape around archive footage and interviews with everyone from Judy Chicago and Yoko Ono to the Guerrilla Girls, alongside curators, critics and historians. Spanning 40 years of art, it’s a great visual history of feminist art, including its hidden history.
Watch on: Kino Now
Among the many films and documentaries that have been made about Warhol, this is one of the more recent titles. Featuring narration from artist and musician Laurie Anderson alongside interview footage, it gives great insight into the artist’s meteoric rise to stardom.
Watch on: YouTube
From the same director as City of God, Fernando Meirelles has created a film that shines a spotlight on Brooklyn-based artist Vik Muniz. More specifically, it documents his intriguing project that has come from one of the world’s biggest rubbish tips, near Rio de Janeiro. It’s also a film very much about the transformative power of creativity, earning itself as Academy Award nomination and a win at the Sundance Film Festival.
Watch on:
Amazon Prime (US)
