Seeing, Searching, Being: Three Films by Ken Burns

"In-between his gargantuan documentary opuses, filmmaker Ken Burns found himself periodically drawn back to the subject of William Segal (1904-2000), a painter, writer, and publisher who drew from the teachings of philosophers including G.I. Gurdjieff and D.T. Suzuki. Through the ideas engendered by these mentors, Burns attempted to fuse eastern and western spiritual traditions into a cohesive whole, to arresting effect. This collection from PBS Home Video contains each of Burns's three films on Segal's life and work. It begins with the 1992 William Segal, a film that burns shot in the artist's garden and studio, which observes the painter as he paints and dissects the nature of the creative process itself. The second film in the collection, 1997's Vezelay, finds Burns and Segal venturing to the legendary basilica of the titular French city, where they draw inspiration from the visual splendor of the work before them and ask incisive questions about the nature of individual identity, existence and the nature of searching itself. Finally, In the Marketplace finds Segal working at a Parisian studio and gallery, where he prepares a lithographic exhibition, and discusses his life and his philosophy of living in the moment."