SANTA BARBARA INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2025 REVIEW! Enchanted Matter: The Art of Robert Powell is a well-constructed, beautiful, and revelatory documentary about artist and architect Robert Powell. I had never heard of Robert Powell, but now I’m enthralled, and my life is all the richer for it. Powell was a trained architect, born in Australia, and on a trip to Bengal, he found himself without a camera and only his architectural pens to document what he saw. Over decades, as he traveled around the Himalayas, he drew and painted the buildings and other cultural artifacts, first with almost entirely pen and ink, then adding progressively more watercolor. His drawings and paintings are extraordinarily precise and intricate while retaining an almost dreamlike quality. Through Powell’s art, we are transported to ancient places in Pakistan, Nepal, and Tibet, as if through a portal in his mind.
At times, Powell acted as a draftsman and ethnographic documentarian, literally sketching artifacts for scholarly works. This is explored by interviews with ethnographic filmmaker Michael Oppitz, who explains that Powell could illuminate them in a way a camera couldn’t. However, Powell’s work went far beyond that, whether they were intricate pen and watercolor renderings of buildings in harmony with their surroundings or nearly hallucinatory abstractions made from culturally important symbols. These ideas are touched on by Anthropologist Charles Ramble, who explains the color palette used by Powell and its cultural significance, and Lieve Powell, Robert’s wife, who muses on his inspirations and drive. But, the majority of the history, technique, and inspiration for the work is explained by Powell himself in a series of interviews done over time.
“…his drawings and paintings are extraordinarily precise and intricate while retaining an almost dreamlike quality.”
Enchanted Matter was completed by producers Geoff Rockwell and Tom Piozet (who also directed), after being asked by Powell before he died or a respiratory illness in 2020. It was edited by Golden Globe and Emmy-nominated Kathryn Himoff. The team has produced a stunning, mesmerizing film based on high-resolution scans of Powell’s work, which sometimes have slight visual effects applied, allowing us to zoom in or to to see some of the objects almost come to life in a subtle but trippy way.
As its title suggests, Enchanted Matter explores the idea of enchantment, that idea of being spellbound, and how inanimate objects can seemingly be imbued with life. Powell himself was influenced by the ideas of social anthropologist Alfred Gell, who argued that art was the technology of enchantment. Powell explains the Enlightenment allowed science to take some of the mystery out of the world, but art can make things weird again. Despite that context, this is no unmoored trip to hippy town but a thoughtful and compelling look at how philosophy, culture, art, and architecture can come together and allow us to see the world differently.
Later in life, Powell got back to architecture, designing the Kamalaya spa and his own home in Thailand. The film takes us on a tour of how the buildings harmoniously integrate with nature, complete with trees growing through buildings and windows placed precisely to view certain natural features. It is a reminder that art can focus our attention on the sublime and give us a path to the transcendent. Enchantment is all around us if we know where and how to look. In that sense, director Tom Piozet is a kindred spirit to Powell — by showing us Powell, his art, and architecture in such a revealing way, he has not just captured magic but conjured it himself.
Enchanted Matter: The Art of Robert Powell had its world premiere at the 2025 Santa Barbara International Film Festival.
"…The Enlightenment allowed science to take some of the mystery out of the world, but art can make things weird again..."
