10 Artists, 10 Netflix Shows They Want Every Artist to Watch

We’ve all been there. Staring at a half-finished piece at midnight, feeling completely empty, wondering where the spark went. Or sitting with a finished project, not knowing what comes next, quietly asking yourself if you still have something worth making. Or just having one of those days where nothing works, everything feels off, and the thing you love most suddenly feels like the thing draining you the most.

Those moments are real. And they’re part of the creative life, the parts we don’t always post about. The parts that don’t make it to the grid.

Here’s the thing though. Those moments pass. They always do. And more often than not, what pulls a creative person through isn’t more discipline or more hustle or another productivity tip. It’s something quieter than that. A conversation with a friend. A walk that went longer than planned. Or sometimes honestly, more often than you’d think, it’s pressing play on something and just letting someone else’s story hold you for a while.

That’s what got us thinking after our piece on the songs artists create with. If music does that what about what they watch? What about the shows that sit with them long after the screen goes dark? The ones they put on during a creative block and couldn’t stop thinking about for days afterward? The ones that made them cry a little, or laugh too loud, or pause and just sit with a feeling for a moment longer than felt comfortable?

Because here’s what we believe at Arts to Hearts Project that the stories we absorb become part of the language we make art in. What you watch shapes how you see. How you see shapes what you make. It’s not separate from the creative process. It is the creative process.

So, we did what we always do. We went straight to our community. We put the question out there simple, open, no rules and we waited.

And oh. The responses.

They came flooding in. So many of them. And honestly? Reading through every single response felt like sitting with a group of friends who were just being completely real with each other. No showing off. No trying to sound a certain way. Just people sharing the shows that had genuinely meant something to them. The ones they watched on a hard night. The ones they couldn’t stop thinking about. The ones that quietly gave them something they didn’t even know they needed.

We wanted to include every single one. But we had to pick our favourites. And it was hard because every recommendation came from a real place and every single one deserved to be here.

We’ll link the original post below so you can go find even more from the community. But these are the ones that stayed with us.

These are their picks..

And the first recommendation that came in, we just weren’t ready for it. It was from Laura Catherine Harman @artbylauraharman . And oh wow. The moment we read it we knew this one had to be first.

What she recommended wasn’t just a list. It felt like a whole conversation about what it actually means to make something and what it quietly takes out of you.

She starts with Bob Ross: Happy Accidents, Betrayal & Greed, and we know what you’re thinking, but it’s not that. It’s not nostalgia. It’s genuinely painful in the best way. It’s about what happens when something pure gets wrapped in money and slowly loses itself. You finish it feeling strangely protective of your own work.

Then Sky Ladder, the story of an artist who held onto one single impossible idea for decades and refused to let it go. If you’ve ever kept going with something that made no logical sense to keep going with, this one will feel like it was made for you.

Velvet Buzzsaw is sharp and dark and a little unhinged a takedown of the art world that will make you laugh and wince in equal measure. And then Basquiat, The Andy Warhol Diaries, Exit Through the Gift Shop three completely different artists, three completely different stories, but all of them asking the same thing. What does it cost to burn that bright?

Watch them back to back if you can. You’ll come out the other side with something to say.

Laura clearly watches with her whole heart. And when you see what she makes, you’ll understand exactly why every show on this list found her.

This next one from Shark Steeze @shark.psd.3dis different in the best possible way. They didn’t just share what they watch. They shared what they study.

Every pick comes with a reason. A specific thing to look at. A specific thing to learn.

Squid Game for set design because every single set in that show is making an argument, not just filling space. The House for stop motion — the kind of work that reminds you what it feels like to make something slowly and completely by hand. Bloodhounds for colour grading — watch it once and you will never look at colour the same way again.

Russian Doll for storytelling. The 8 Show for what it looks like when someone commits fully to an original idea and doesn’t flinch.

This is someone who watches like an artist. And when you see what they create, that will make complete sense.

Pure magic. That’s the only way to describe what Janvi Rathod @janki_arts sent us.

Every single pick is a world you can disappear into. And sometimes that’s exactly what a tired creative needs. Bridgerton first. If you’ve dismissed it as guilty pleasure, look again. The costume design alone is extraordinary. Then Studio Ghibli: Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, Kiki’s Delivery Service. Three films that understand, at a cellular level, how to build a world that feels lived-in and alive.

And Loving Vincent. Seventy artists. Sixty-five thousand frames. Every one painted by hand. A film made exactly the way Van Gogh himself painted with obsession and complete disregard for what would have been easier.

If that doesn’t make you want to pick up a brush, nothing will.

Janki makes work that carries that same kind of wonder. Go spend some time with it.

Patricia Gillberg @leomhannlotus didn’t suggest a list. Just one show. One answer. And she was completely sure about it. That kind of certainty, that’s an artist who knows exactly what moves her.

Every creature physically built. Every set constructed by hand. Every blade of grass puppeteered by a real person who showed up and made something that had never existed before. It is one of the most ambitious things ever attempted on screen and it is a monument to the idea that the care you pour into something becomes part of the thing itself.

For any creative who has ever been told they’re being too slow, too precious, too obsessive about the details, this show is your vindication.

Go look at their work. Then go watch this. You’ll feel it.

Anahid Ilieva @anahid.ilieva came with a list that feels like it was curated by someone who has thought very deeply about what good storytelling actually is. Every single show here is completely, unmistakably itself.

Arcane first, and if you haven’t seen it yet we genuinely don’t know what to tell you. It is one of the most visually stunning things ever made. Every frame looks like someone cared about it personally. Then Maniac — strange and tender and unlike anything else. Russian Doll for what it does with structure and emotion at the same time. Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency for the joy of watching a show that truly believes everything is connected.

And then she goes off Netflix entirely for her last pick. Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein (2025). A director who carried one vision for decades and finally got to make it. There’s something quietly moving about that and she knew we needed to see it.

Go explore what she creates. It will all make sense.

Every pick from Sonja Picard Artist @sonjapicardfineart is dripping with visual intention. This is a mood board in motion.

Ripley — shot entirely in black and white with a stillness that feels almost painted. Every frame composed like someone who spent years studying the old masters. If you watch one thing from this entire article, let it be this.

The Power of the Dog for landscape and silence and what hides beneath the surface of things. Moulin Rouge for pure maximalism — every colour, every feeling, every era thrown into one room and set on fire. Midnight in Paris for the artists of 1920s Paris just wandering the same cobblestones as each other, alive and impossible and real.

And Blue Jasmine to close. Because the most compelling characters are always the ones we can’t quite figure out.

When you see what Sonja creates, you’ll understand exactly why this list is hers.

Bianca Youngers @biancayoungersart said it in three words. And honestly she didn’t need more than that.

And if you’ve seen it you already know exactly why. Wes Anderson’s love letter to journalism and art and the kind of people who dedicate their whole lives to making something beautiful shot like every single frame was a painting someone spent weeks composing. Because they did. Because that’s what this film is. A reminder that the way something looks is never just decoration. It’s the whole point.

For any creative who has ever been told they’re being too precious about the details , watch this. Then watch it again.

Go see what Bianca creates. One word from her and we were already convinced.

Linda Laforge @lindalaforgeartcame prepared. A list, a reason for every single pick. That kind of generosity is exactly what this community is built on.

Face Off is her opener and if you haven’t seen it please just trust her on this one. It’s a reality show about special effects makeup and it will completely change how you think about creativity under pressure. One episode. That’s all it takes. You’ll never look at a deadline the same way again.

Stranger Things for the world-building. Love, Death + Robots her words were massive ideas in mini movies and she’s absolutely right. Watch it like you’re walking through a gallery. Slowly. With your full attention. The Big Fake about an art forger in 1970s Rome this one will sit in your chest for days, we’re warning you now.

And she closes with How to Change Your Mind. Because she gets it. Creativity isn’t just in the hands. It’s in the brain. In the way you perceive things. And anything that shifts how you see the world shifts what you’re able to make.

Honestly go look at what Linda creates. It will all make so much sense.

Mary Papageorgiou @marypapageorgiou_artist said something that stopped us. She looks for series she would rewatch and have.

Not just good. Not just worth watching once. Worth returning to. Worth living inside again. And that phrase alone is a creative brief.

Peaky Blinders for brooding painterly cinematography. Ozark for cold controlled colour and quiet dread sustained across every frame. Stranger Things its third appearance in this article for the world-building.

The Crown for storytelling restraint and costumes that communicate character before a word is spoken. Mad Men for aesthetics that say something true about emptiness and ambition. And The Sopranos still one of the greatest studies of a complex human being ever put on screen.

Go spend time with her work. You’ll understand exactly why she watches the way she watches.

Our last one is from Mirjana Conte @mirjana.conte.art And when we read it we just smiled. Because this is so perfectly how this community shows up.

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Because that energy that slightly overwhelmed, deeply grateful, heart-fully-open energy — that’s not someone performing enthusiasm. That’s someone who genuinely lets the world in. All of it. All the time. And you feel it instantly.

Manifest for purpose, why are we here, what are we meant to do. Maid for those days when life is hard and you need to watch someone keep going anyway. Brené Brown’s Call to Courage because every creative person lives with uncertainty and most of us don’t talk about it enough. Jumping from High Places for the anxiety that quietly lives inside the making.

And then she goes beyond Netflix because of course she does. IF on Prime, which makes her cry every time for reminding her of the child still living inside all of us. Upgraded and Musica closing out a list that is just so warm, so human, so completely hers.

This is what it looks like when an artist moves through the world with their whole heart open. Finding something meaningful in everything. Sharing it without holding a single thing back.

Go look at what she creates. And then go find something on her list for tonight.

And that’s a wrap on this one. Ten artists. Ten lists. So many shows we now have absolutely no excuse to be uninspired ever again.

This community never shows up halfway. Every time we ask something you come back with something so real, so thoughtful, so genuinely useful that we want to share all of it. We couldn’t fit everything here so we’ve linked the original post below go see what everyone else recommended. There is so much more where this came from.

More conversations like this are coming. Always more.

Follow us on Instagram, because we’re always asking. About your studio, your creative process, your inspirations, your creative blocks, your routines, the things that keep you going and the things that don’t. And almost every single time, we all end up learning something we really needed to hear.

Share your thoughts when you see the next question. And who knows, maybe next time it’ll be you we’re featuring.