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More lives of the artists...

All the Beauty and the Bloodshed

Photographer Nan Goldin, always a risk-taker, put her career on the line when she decided to shame museums into exposing the role played by a family of major art patrons in fueling America’s opioid crisis. Laura Poitras’ Oscar-nominated documentary, available March 19, offers a stirring portrait of the artist. HBO Max

Ursula von Rydingsvard: Into Her Own

Von Rydingsvard builds huge wooden sculptures that appear at once organic and otherworldly. To watch her at work in her Brooklyn studio is a reward in itself. Better is also hearing her describe how the work emerges from a life that began in World War II refugee camps. Tubi

Pat Steir: Artist

Steir was an abstract artist at a time when women weren’t thought to possess “the gene.” Following Steir, now in her 80s, as she develops her “waterfall” paintings, is biography as poetry. Roku

Carlos Almaraz: Playing With Fire

Almaraz, a seminal figure in the Chicano art movement, is celebrated in a sweeping biographical portrait that laments his death at 48 and highlights his unique ability to capture the light and dark of 1970s–’80s Los Angeles. Netflix

Lifeline: Clyfford Still

Seen alongside the work of other great abstract painters, Still’s paintings stand out. This documentary explains why he’s sometimes overlooked. $3 on Vudu

M.C. Escher: Journey to Infinity

More than just the creator of trippy architectural visions, Escher was a genius of an artist who managed to tap into the soul of mathematics, as this documentary shows. $3 on Amazon Prime