Apolonia, Apolonia

Lea Glob's 2023 Danish documentary was filmed across thirteen years. When Glob first filmed the painter Apolonia Sokol in 2009, her life looked like a storybook: born in an underground theatre in Paris, raised in an artists' community, studying at the Beaux-Arts. The film records over the years her attempt to enter the art market, her dealings with collectors, and the wall she meets as a woman painter. The documentary's unexpected layer is the director's own life entering the story: a life-threatening complication Glob suffered in childbirth changes the film's direction and turns it into the parallel story of two women. The place of the Ukrainian activist Oksana Shachko in the narrative forms its most painful section. It won the main competition award at IDFA in Amsterdam. Who it's for: viewers interested in long-form portrait documentary, criticism of the art market and stories about women artists. Who it's not for: anyone avoiding content about suicide and childbirth complications, or who will find a loose structure spread over thirteen years wearing.