''Herb and Dorothy'' is a 2008 documentary film by Megumi Sasaki. The film tells the story of two middle-class collectors of

contemporary art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic com ...

Herbert and Dorothy Vogel Herbert Vogel (August 16, 1922 – July 22, 2012) and Dorothy Vogel (born 1935), once described as "proletarian art collectors," worked as civil servants in New York City for more than a half-century while amassing what has been called one of the ...

, and the enormous and valuable collection of

conceptual art Conceptual art, also referred to as conceptualism, is art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic, technical, and material concerns. Some works of conceptual art, sometimes called insta ...

and

minimalist art Minimalism describes movements in various forms of art and design, especially visual art and music, where the work is set out to expose the essence, essentials or identity of a subject through eliminating all non-essential forms, features or conc ...

they amassed in spite of their relatively meager salaries as New York City civil servants. Many artists are interviewed in the film, including

Christo Christo Vladimirov Javacheff (1935–2020) and Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon (1935–2009), known as Christo and Jeanne-Claude, were artists noted for their large-scale, site-specific art, site-specific environmental art, environmental art i ...

Chuck Close Charles Thomas Close (July 5, 1940 – August 19, 2021) was an American painter, visual artist, and photographer who made massive-scale photorealist and abstract portraits of himself and others. Close also created photo portraits using a very l ...

Robert Mangold Robert Mangold (born October 12, 1937) is an American minimalist artist. He is also father of film director and screenwriter James Mangold. Early life and education Mangold was born in North Tonawanda, New York. His mother, Blanche, was a ...

, and

Pat Steir Pat Steir (born 1940) is an American painter and printmaker. Her early work was loosely associated with conceptual art and minimalism, however, she is best known for her abstract dripped, splashed and poured "Waterfall" paintings, which she s ...

. , the film had made $194,721 at the box office.

Awards

*2008 Audience Award for Best Documentary,

Hamptons International Film Festival The Hamptons International Film Festival (HIFF) is an international film festival founded in 1992, by Joyce Robinson. The festival has since taken place every year in East Hampton, New York. It is usually an annual five-day event in mid-October a ...

*2008 Golden Starfish Documentary Feature Award, Hamptons International Film Festival *2008 Audience Award,

Silverdocs Documentary Festival The AFI Docs (formerly Silverdocs) documentary film festival is an American international film festival created by the American Film Institute and the Discovery Channel. It is held every year in Silver Spring, Maryland and Washington, D.C. Started ...

*2008 Audience Award for Best Documentary,

Philadelphia Film Festival The Philadelphia Film Festival is a film festival founded by the Philadelphia Film Society held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The annual festival is held at various theater venues throughout the Greater Philadelphia Area. Overview The annual f ...

*2009 HBO Audience Award, Best Documentary,

Provincetown International Film Festival The Provincetown International Film Festival (PIFF) is an annual film festival founded in 1999 and held on Cape Cod in Provincetown, Massachusetts. The festival presents American and international narrative features, documentaries and short films f ...

References

External links

* *
Herb and Dorothy
site for

Independent Lens ''Independent Lens'' is a weekly television series airing on PBS featuring documentary films made by independent filmmakers. Past seasons of ''Independent Lens'' were hosted by Angela Bassett, Don Cheadle, Susan Sarandon, Edie Falco, Terrence Ho ...

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

2008 films American documentary films Documentary films about the visual arts Documentary films about New York City 2000s English-language films 2000s American films {{arts-documentary-film-stub