Stay Inspired with These Must-Watch Photography Documentaries
No matter how prolific of an artist you think you are, there are times when you're going to feel uninspired or go through creative blocks. Aside from photo books, documentaries are one of my favorite ways to stay inspired. No matter how I'm feeling, whenever I watch a good photo documentary, I am always itching to shoot before the movie is even over.
Over the last few years, I've seen A LOT of documentaries. So for my first blog post ever, I decided to go back and compile an extensive list of my favorites. Ranging from street photography, portraits, landscapes, and much more…there is no doubt that something in here will leave you inspired.
*Note: You can find most of these documentaries in a variety of places online with a few google searches. For the sake of my sanity, I am only linking one or two options for each. Do your own research if you want to avoid paying or if you use different sites/subscriptions than the ones listed.
Everybody Street
“Everybody Street" highlights the lives and work of New York's iconic street photographers and the unparalleled city that has inspired them for decades.
Link: Watch on Amazon
Garry Winogrand:
All Things Are Photographable
A documentary about an important American still photographer who captured New York City in the 1960s (his work there is said to have influenced the TV show Mad Men) and later the West in Texas and Los Angeles.
Link: Watch on Amazon
Joel Meyerowitz: Sense of Time
This hour-long, widescreen, retrospective documentary gives an overview of nearly every series Meyerowitz made over the last 52 years. The filmmakers were allowed to accompany the photographer over three years and went out on the streets of New York and Paris, also following his footsteps in Cape Cod, France and Italy.
Links: Watch on Vimeo
Joel Meyerowitz: The Pulse of the Street
Over 52 minutes interspersed with archive footage, Meyerowitz analyses the change in his views at the end of the sixties, justifies his aesthetic and political biases, makes photography's upheavals echo those of the world, and lucidly deciphers the changes of era.
Last Stop Coney Island: The Life and Photography of Harold Feinstein
The definitive story of legendary American photographer Harold Feinstein.
Link: Watch on Vimeo
Fill The Frame
With the continuing rise of the digital age and popularity of social media, the genre of street photography has propelled like we've never seen before. Still there is more opportunity for street photography to be recognized and appreciated by the masses.
Links: Watch on YouTube
Martha Cooper: A Picture Story
In 1970s New York, photographer Martha Cooper captured some of the first images of graffiti at a time when the city had declared war on it. Decades later, Cooper has become influential to the global movement of street artists.
Links: Watch on Amazon
The Colourful Mr. Eggleston
Documentary about famous American photographer William Eggleston, one of the first art photographers to use color film.
Links: Watch on Vimeo
Bill Cunningham: New York
A profile of the noted and extraordinarily cheerful veteran New York City fashion photographer.
Links: Watch on Amazon
Sebastião Salgado: The Salt of the Earth
The life and work of photographer Sebastião Salgado, who has spent forty years documenting societies in hidden corners of the world.
Links: Watch on Amazon
Meeting Sebastião Salgado
The first Brazilian documentary about the life and work of Sebastião Salgado, one of the greatest contemporary photographers.
Links: Watch on Amazon
A Choice of Weapons: Inspired by Gordon Parks
Follows Gordon Parks' stellar career from staff photographer for LIFE magazine, through his artistic development photographing everyday Americans, through his evolution as a novelist and groundbreaking filmmaker.
Links: Watch on Amazon
Harry Gruyaert: Photographer
75 year old Magnum member Harry Gruyaert's life is saved by colour. Coming from a repressed and grey background he discovers the lights and colour of Europe. Driven by hatred and love and the irresistible desire to be a photographer, he becomes a pioneer in European colour photography.
Links: Watch on Vimeo
The Many Lives of William Klein
William Klein has lived many lives. One of the world's most influential photographers, he pioneered the art of street photography and created some of the most iconic fashion images of the 20th century.
Links: Watch via Internet Archive
In No Great Hurry: 13 Lessons in Life with Saul Leiter
Saul Leiter could have been lauded as the great the pioneer of color photography, but was never driven by the lure of success. Instead he preferred to drink coffee and photograph in his own way, amassing an archive of beautiful work that is now piled high in his New York apartment. An intimate and personal film, In No Great Hurry follows Saul as he deals with the triple burden of clearing an apartment full of memories, becoming world famous in his 80s and fending off a pesky filmmaker.
Links: Watch on Apple TV
Robert Frank: Don’t Blink
Robert Frank revolutionized photography and independent film. He documented the Beats, Welsh coal miners, Peruvian Indians, The Stones, London bankers, and the Americans. This is the bumpy ride, revealed with unblinking honesty by the reclusive artist himself.
Links: Watch on Amazon
James Nachtwey: War Photographer
Documentary about war photographer James Nachtwey, considered by many the greatest war photographer ever.
Links: Watch on YouTube
See Know Evil: Davide Sorrenti
An uncensored look into the life of 90's fashion photographer and youth culture icon, Davide Sorrenti. Known for prodigious photos and ending "heroin chic", this is the story of a young photographer and how he came to define an era.
Links: Watch on Amazon
Ricky Powell: The Individualist
The life, work and demons of NYC street photographer Ricky Powell.
Links: Watch on Amazon
Nan Goldin: All the Beauty and the Bloodshed
Follows the life of artist Nan Goldin and the downfall of the Sackler family, the pharmaceutical dynasty who was greatly responsible for the opioid epidemic's unfathomable death toll.
Links: Watch on Amazon
Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters
A documentary shot over a decade with unprecedented access to photographer Gregory Crewdson that bares the artist's process.
Links: Watch on Apple TV
Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Impassioned Eye
Artist Henri Cartier-Bresson comments on several of his photographs. One of the last films shot with the photographer, also featuring Robert Delpire, Elliott Erwitt, Isabelle Huppert, Josef Koudelka, Arthur Miller, and Ferdinando Scianna.
Links: Watch on YouTube
Stephen Shore: New Color Photography
American photographer Stephen Shore (born 1947) is a leading representative of the New Color Photography movement in the United States. From the early 1970s onwards, Shore made several road trips across the country documenting life in America with an apparent banality that provoked much controversy among his contemporaries.
Links: Watch on Vimeo
Peter Lindbergh: The Supermodel Photographer
Peter Lindbergh was the only German in the select group of photographers who have found international acclaim in the worlds of fashion and advertising.
Links: Watch on YouTube
Jay Myself: Jay Maisel
Jamel Shabazz: Street Photographer
Documentary following New York photographer Jamel Shabazz, who captured the style and essence of hip hop as it exploded onto the streets of New York. Exclusive interviews and his iconic images chronicle the movement’s origin story and lasting influence.
Links: Watch on Amazon