Ben Lewis (documentary filmmaker)

Ben Lewis (* 1966 ) is a British documentary filmmaker , author and art critic.

Life

Lewis studied history and art history in Cambridge and Berlin. In his twenties he worked at MTV , as a DJ and briefly ran a record label before working in magazine formats for the BBC and Channel 4 . In 2001 he established his own production company BLTV.

His works include "The King of Communism: The pomp and pageantry Nicolae Ceaușescu, " for which he won a Grierson Award in 2002; “Hammer and Tickle: the Communist Joke Book”, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2006 and was named best documentary at the Zurich Film Festival that same year . The book based on it was published by Weidenfeld and Nicholson in 2008.

His Art Safari series on contemporary artists won bronze at the New York Television Awards and was awarded the 2007 Grimme Prize . Art Safari portrayed a. a. Maurizio Cattelan , Takashi Murakami , Matthew Barney , Sophie Calle and Wim Delvoye . On behalf of Deutsche Bank, Lewis also produced an “Art Safari” film as a limited edition on DVD for the Deutsche Guggenheim exhibition “Affinities” 2007.

His film The Great Contemporary Art Bubble, about the rise and fall of the contemporary art market, was the opening film at the Tel Aviv Arts Film Festival and won the award for best documentary feature at the Foyle International Film Festival .

He writes a monthly art column for Prospect magazine . Lewis has appeared in the Evening Standard , The Times, Sunday Times , The Observer , Financial Times and the Sunday Telegraph, as well as Monopol and the Israeli magazine Programma .

As part of the art show Art Safari on ARTE , Lewis had a motif tattooed by Wim Delvoye .

Fonts (selection)

• The Last Leonardo. The making of a masterpiece . London: Harper, Collins 2019. ISBN 978-0-00831342-5
• Horizons, Zones and Outer Spaces.The Art of John Loker London: King 2019. ISBN 978-1-78627442-7

Web links

• Ben Lewis in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Ben Lewis' biography