*Dave checking out some of the Gerhard Richter paintings at the Tate Modern earlier this year.*

I love documentaries, especially documentaries about people who are creatives, visionaries and pioneers. Not only do I get a glimpse into their creative process, I get to be inspired.

Let yourself be inspired, here are ten documentaries to get you started:

Gerhard Richter Painting I LOVE to see artists at work and gain insight into their creative process. This documentary left me feeling validated and inspired. Seeing an entire room of his paintings in London earlier this year was the cherry on top.
Cameraman: The Life and Work of Jack Cardiff The man did an artistic film called The Red Shoes in the '40s, and Rambo in the '80s! With contributions from Martin Scorsese, Kirk Douglas and Lauren Bacall, this documentary was a great look into a man's creative legacy.
Herb & Dorothy A fascinating story about Herb and Dorothy Vogel, a postal clerk and a librarian, who were two of the most famous art collectors in New York.
EAMES: The Architect and the Painter A glimpse into the creativity and lives of husband-and-wife team Charles and Ray Eames. LOVED it! Someday I will own an Eames chair...
America's Castles: The Homes of Frank Lloyd Wright This is a great introduction to Wright's work and vision. Unfortunately I couldn't find anything recent to link to for this one, but if you can find it on Netflix or at your local library, I highly recommend it.
Objectified Done by the same folks who brought us a documentary devoted to Helvetica, the font, Objectified is an enlightening look at industrial design and the detailed planning that goes into anything from the lowly potato peeler to the technology we use every day.
The September Issue A great glance into the life of Anna Wintour and Vogue magazine's prep for its biggest issue of the year – and in Grace Coddington's creative process for coming up with the photos made famous on the news stands.
Bill Cunningham New York People like Mr. Cunningham, who do what they love and love what they do, inspire me. Period.
Visual Acoustics: The Modernism of Julius Shulman Another inspiring story about a long-time practitioner of his craft: architectural photographer Julius Shulman. Beautiful, beautiful images.
In the Realms of the Unreal (see trailer below) A documentary about unknown-to-me self-taught artist Henry Darger. This man meticulously created an incredible imaginary world for himself, I don't think I've ever seen anyone so prolific. His story is eccentric and his art sometimes disturbing, well worth the watch.

How about you, do you have any favourite documentaries?

I'm always up for a new one!

You didn't think I'd forgotten, did you?

Week two of Four Weeks of 40 is here and it's all about art!

This week I've compiled a list of 40 creative individuals who, for some reason or another, intrigue, inspire, or simply delight.

I stuck mostly to visual art: painters (though many were fluently creative in multiple mediums), a few photographers, and, just to keep it interesting, I threw an architect/designer into the mix.

In some cases I linked to an official artist's page, others to something generic like a Wikipedia article. Sometimes I simply linked to a Google search for images, because the images are what speak most to me about that particular artist (note: with this last one, there may be images that aren't by the artist, but are somehow tagged so that they show up).

Voici, in no particular order, artists that intrigue, inspire or delight...

1. Henri Matisse

2. Frida Kahlo For those who know me well or follow me on Facebook, I'm sure this comes as no surprise!

3. Wassily Kandinsky

4. Maurice Denis

5. Kees van Dongen (image below via WikiPaintings)

6. Emily Carr

7. Paul Klee

8. Claude Monet

9. Odilon Redon

"My drawings inspire, and are not to be defined. They place us, as does music, in the ambiguous realm of the undetermined." - Odilon Redon

10. Pablo Picasso

11. Diego Rivera

12. Ansel Adams

13. Edward Weston

14. Marc Chagall

15. Edgar Degas

16. Mary Delany

From a description on the British Museum's website:

"At the age of 72 she [Mary Delany] began to imitate flowers in paper collage as an ‘employment and amusement... '... Her skill was such that the great eighteenth-century botanist Sir Joseph Banks declared that these collages were ‘the only imitations of nature that he had ever seen from which he could venture to describe botanically any plant without the least fear of committing an error'."

17. Vincent Van Gogh

18. Gerhard Richter

19. Frank Lloyd Wright

20. Henri Rousseau

21. Jean-Paul Riopelle

22. Gustav Klimt

23. Amedeo Modigliani

24. Mark Rothko

25. Henry Darger I learned about Henry Darger in a documentary I randomly picked up at the library; though I find some of his art disturbing, his story fascinates me. The link is to the documentary trailer.

26. Georgia O'Keeffe

27. Edward Hopper

28. René Magritte

29. Paul Cezanne

30. & 31. Frances and Margaret MacDonald (image below by Frances MacDonald McNair (watercolour) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons)

32. Rolf Armstrong

33. Man Ray

34. Lilias Torrance-Newton

35. Jean-Paul Lemieux

36. Maud Lewis

37. Lawren Harris

"We were told, quite seriously, that there never would be a Canadian art because we had no art tradition." - Lawren Harris, Canadian artist and member of the Group of Seven

38. Edwin Holgate

39. Tamara de Lempicka (image below via WikiPaintings)

Self-Portrait in the Green Bugatti - Tamara de Lempicka

40. Joan Miro

"The works must be conceived with fire in the soul but executed with clinical coolness." - Joan Miro