Paints on Ceiling (2008)

Sometimes, an entire lifetime is decided in a moment. At least it was for Isaiah Zagar, whose mother's scream when he was three set him on the road to becoming an artist. In this striking, dream-like film, his son, Jeremiah reenacts the incident when his father had his epiphany: Letting his crayon stray outside the lines in the coloring book, to the formica kitchen table, then the floor, up the refrigerator and finally scrambling to the top of that appliance in order to color on the ceiling. When his mother walked in and saw her son veer on the edge, her terrified cry convinced him that his destiny was to evoke similar reactions from others to his art. Now a famous Philadelphia mosaic and mural artist, Isaiah Zagara exploration of this moment offers remarkable insight into the mind of a fascinating and complex man, the subject of his son's first full-length documentary that won the Emerging Visions Award at its debut at the 2008 South by Southwest film festival