Nathan-ism

What Happens When Memories Take On A Life Of Their Own?

At the end of World War II, Nathan Hilu, the son of Syrian Jewish immigrants to New York, received a life-changing assignment from the U.S. Army: to guard the top Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg trials. This experience fueled a lifetime of artistic inspiration for Nathan, a virtually unknown “outsider artist”, who spent the next 70 years obsessively creating a visual narrative from his memories.

Filmmaker Elan Golod’s documentary is a portrait of the aging artist that begins as a peek at a unique witness to history and grows into an absorbing study of the function of art as an archive and invention.

Daring to question an artist’s stories, Nathan-ism is a fascinating look at one man’s need to share truths with a world that doesn’t always want to listen.