Death Row Art Star

Since the 1970s, Aron Ranen has been active as an underground documentary filmmaker with a penchant for special cases. Previously, he exposed spiritual healers, and in Did We Go? he examined whether Apollo 11 actually landed on the moon. Death Row Art Star is a story, told in a tearing rush, about prison art, but more particularly it is a portrait of the unusual patroness and publisher of this art. In addition to her photo studio, the 70-year-old religious glamour photographer Audrey runs a small publishing company. She collects art made by prisoners and puts it in a magazine that sells like hotcakes to inmates all across the country. The contributions include work by America's cruellest serial killers, who have now repented. The most popular drawings are those by Alfredo Valdez; not a serial killer, but still one of the many inmates on death row in San Quentin prison. Audrey receives a lot of fan mail for Valdez through the magazine. The fact that she changes parts of Valdez's drawings now and then and adds a picture of Jesus Christ does not seem to bother anyone. (International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam)