In a new short film, The Story of Jon Burgerman, filmmaker Bas Berkhout dives into Burgerman’s creative process and family history. Burgerman, known for his whimsical, cartoon-inspired works, has a must-follow Instagram full of his art and photos of everyday objects with unexpected faces doodled on them.
The film is the latest instalment of Berkhout’s Like Knows Like project, in which he meets a variety of creative people and explores their process through short documentaries. The Story of Jon Burgerman touches on a wide range of subjects in a very short time, including Burgerman’s musical endeavours, his childhood, and his grandfather’s experience as a Holocaust survivor. Berkhout shot photos for Burgerman’s recent book, It’s Great to Create, and decided to create the film after finding that he had a lot of footage left over.
Burgerman displays an optimistic and playful approach to work that fits the goofy feel of his artwork. “I suffer as much as anyone else with self doubt, and not really knowing if it’s the right thing, or if it’s a good thing that I’m doing,” he says in the film. “I think that’s normal. But I just keep going. What is it that I want to make? Sometimes they can be grand things, and sometimes they can be small things, like, I’m going to make a little comic strip.”
Watch The Story of Jon Burgerman below, and find more of Jon Burgerman’s work at his portfolio. You can also watch more of Bas Berkhout’s work in our InFrame series, and read our interview with him here.
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