kviff.com
News
Festival Guide
  • Tickets and Festival Pass
  • Accommodations
  • Transportation
  • Festival cinemas
  • No Barriers project
  • Kids at the festival
  • Festival Shop
Program
  • Catalogue of films
  • Accompanying programme
  • Archive of films
  • Audience award
  • KVIFF Talks
  • Film Entry
Film Industry
  • Industry accreditation
  • Film Industry at KVIFF
  • Industry Days Programme
  • KVIFF Eastern Promises
  • KVIFF Talents
Press
  • Press accreditation
  • Press Service
  • For download
  • Press releases
  • Photogallery
  • Videogallery
About the festival
  • Festival description
  • Programme sections
  • Awards
  • History
  • We support non-profits
  • Photogallery
  • Partners
  • Why We Support the Festival
  • Contacts
CZ
Sign in
Film Archive

David Lynch: The Art Life

Out of the Past 2017 / David Lynch: The Art Life / USA, Denmark 2016

David Lynch – perhaps everyone knows the director, but can they say the same about David Lynch the painter, sculptor, and musician? And can these roles be somehow separated? Just this once the standard bearer of postmodern cinematography leaves the door closed on his bizarre fictional worlds, admitting us instead to his own private realm, which he introduces through personal memories dedicated to his youngest daughter.

David Lynch: The Art Life David Lynch: The Art Life

Synopsis

David Lynch – a director who needs no introduction. Slowly but surely the attributes implied by his name have come to serve as the common notion of “strange”: films that treat storytelling and cinematic time atypically or that contain traces of surrealism. But how does he himself view his work and how does he position it in the context of his life? The documentary David Lynch: The Art Life is dedicated to Lynch’s youngest daughter, and appropriately so. He gives an intimate account of his memories of childhood, adolescence, and his early artistic career, the latter of which ended the moment he shouted “Action!” on the set of Eraserhead (1977). David Lynch the painter, sculptor, and musician comes to the fore during the movie’s hour-and-a-half runtime, a creator for whom cinema is the synthesis of all the artistic disciplines in which he is active. The present is symbolized by the studio in Lynch’s home, the past by multiple visual archives – with the two lines organically merging into a portrait of a complex artist who, just this once, doesn’t conjure up bizarre fictional worlds, but instead admits us into his own private realm.

Anna Kořínek

About the film

93 min / Color, DCP

Director Jon Nguyen, Rick Barnes, Olivia Neergaard-Holm / Dir. of Photography Jason S. / Music Jonatan Bengta / Editor Olivia Neergaard-Holm / Producer Jon Nguyen, Jason S., Sabrina Sutherland / Production David Lynch Documentary / Cast David Lynch / Sales Film Constellation Ltd.

About the director

Jon Nguyen, Rick Barnes, Olivia Neergaard-Holm Jon Nguyen, Rick Barnes, Olivia Neergaard-Holm Jon Nguyen, Rick Barnes, Olivia Neergaard-Holm

Jon Nguyen is a producer and director who has already cooperated on other projects about David Lynch (the documentary Lynch, 2007; David Lynch Presents Interview Project Germany, 2011). Rick Barnes focused on TV and radio communications during his studies at the University of Idaho. Although adept at a variety of filmmaking tasks, he feels most at home behind the camera. David Lynch: The Art Life represents the directing debut of Neergaard-Holm and Barnes. Olivia Neergaard-Holm graduated in 2013 from the National Film School of Denmark. In addition to screenwriting and editing she also directs. She wrote and edited the festival favorite Victoria (2015) from director Sebastian Schipper.

Contacts

Film Constellation Ltd.
124 City Road, EC1V 2NX, London
United Kingdom
Phone: +44 7900 992 088
E-mail: [email protected]

Guests

Edward Parodi
Sales Agent

Other partners
Newsletter

First-hand brews throughout the year.
Be among the first to learn about upcoming events and other news. We only send the newsletter when we have something to say.

Follow us on the web:

The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival
is part of the KVIFF Group family, which covers other projects as well:

© 2025 KVIFF GROUP

Rules for Visitors / Website visitors privacy policy / GTC / Personal Data Protection / Rules for Claim / Rules and Regulations / Contacts