Coming to Brooklyn’s Nitehawk Cinema for its Summer Documentary Series (in collaboration with the Tribeca Film Institute) tomorrow, Tuesday, July 22: ART AND CRAFT
Directors Sam Cullman and Jennifer Grausman and co-director Mark Becker’s profile of a compulsive charlatan had its world premiere at Tribeca this Spring. It’s gone on to screen at Nantucket, Hot Docs, Montclair, Maryland, and San Francisco, among others.
I previously wrote about the film for the Nantucket program, saying:
Over the past 30 years, Mark Landis has placed his art in museums across the country – an impressive feat under normal circumstances, but especially noteworthy in this case, because Landis is an art forger. He doesn’t seek financial gain for his copies, but instead donates his work, adopting various identities – from estate executor to Jesuit priest – to facilitate his gifting. Technically, he may not even have committed a crime, but that hasn’t stopped Matthew Leininger, the museum registrar who first discovered Landis’ con, in his mission to end the deception. Tackling questions of authorship, authenticity, mental illness, and purpose, the filmmakers have crafted a complex portrait of an unforgettable character.
what (not) to doc 