Art21 releases a new documentary short on Anne Imhof, charting the creation of her largest project to date. Directed by Ian Forster for the Extended Play series, the film goes live on Wednesday, August 20, 2025, at 12pm ET on Art21.org and YouTube.
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The camera joins Imhof and her collaborators as they shape DOOM House of Hope inside the Park Avenue Armory’s Drill Hall, then stays for the electricity of opening night.
Imhof recasts the vast hall as a prom-styled gym. Streamers hang from rafters, balloons cluster near bleachers, Cadillac Escalades idle under the lights. Over three hours the cast moves through dance, music, and skateboarding while Imhof stages Romeo and Juliet in reverse. The work studies youth codes and shifting norms and builds a live collage where bodies, props, and sound set the tempo.
The film positions DOOM within the arc of Imhof’s recent practice. Alongside the Armory performance, the crew visits Wish You Were Gay from 2024, where the artist showed early video pieces beside new sculptures and paintings. That exhibition opens a line to the present, grounding House of Hope in formative memories and studio experiments that continue to shape her methods.
Imhof speaks plainly about the stakes of the project. “DOOM was telling the story of these wounds,” she says. “In my case, the wound was shaped into a diamond. I felt this art was this valuable thing in me that I could use, but the shaping wasn’t always easy.” The statement reads like a key to the film’s structure. Rehearsal footage sits next to performance sequences so the viewer can feel the chisel marks as choices harden into form.
Forster underlines the civic charge that runs through the piece. “Anne’s performance, at the center of this documentary, was created leading up to the presidential election and staged just after Trump’s inauguration,” he notes. “It addresses bodily autonomy and the freedom to love openly without threat or government interference. These freedoms are now under greater assault, which underscores the urgency of Anne’s message and the artist’s role in keeping such issues at the center of public consciousness.”
Since its founding, Art21 has focused on meeting audiences where they are and widening access to artists and ideas. The organization has produced more than 80 hours of films and documented over 300 artists on six continents. Anne Imhof DOOM extends that record with a close, process-forward portrait that tracks the hours in the studio, the quick adjustments on site, and the momentum that carries into showtime.
The film premieres online Wednesday, August 20, 2025 at 12:00 p.m. ET on Art21.org and YouTube.
