David Lynch: The Art Life

This documentary focuses almost entirely on David Lynch as a visual artist. We see his intense enjoyment of what he calls ‘the art life’: happily working away in a well-equipped studio in the Hollywood hills. Lynch has everything to hand, including his youngest daughter Lula.

As stunning archive footage and his artworks pass by on screen, we hear him talk about the old days. His tastefully presented reminiscences and juicy anecdotes reveal a lot about his roots as an artist. Lynch grew up in a nice suburb and says he had a happy childhood with loving parents who gave him complete freedom to find out what he wanted. He hung around with the wrong crowd for a while, but once he discovered art everything fell into place. Art allowed him to create his own world “full of splendour and darkness” – one we have come to characterise as Lynchian. The documentary covers the period up to the making of his film breakthrough Eraserhead (1977) – his first “moving painting with sound”.

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