Opens: November 28
Genre: Arts documentary
Duration: 82 minutes

Like all outstanding documentaries, the ones we remember, Martha: A Picture Story is about much more than what it seems to be about on the surface.

It can be most obviously described as being about a photographer who documented the hip-hop graffiti spray-painted across New York’s trains and walls in the late 70s and early ‘80s. But if that’s all there were to it, I wouldn’t be reviewing it here and it might not have won the Audience Award for best documentary at this year’s Sydney Film Festival.

What makes Martha work so well is that it paints a multi-layered and intimate portrait of an inspiring and unique veteran woman artist who has spent her career taking risks and winning respect in a work scene dominated by males. Her name is Martha Cooper. She’s now in her 70s and at the time of filming was still professionally active.

Cooper’s photos of graffiti-art (or plain graffiti, as some will prefer) fits into a life-long practice of documenting the cultures...