You can be forgiven if the most famous artworks of Mierle Laderman Ukeles don’t immediately spring to mind—you won’t find them mass-produced in museum gift shops. But after seeing her decades of revolutionary artmaking unfold in this eye-opening film, you will quickly find yourself in awe of Ukeles the person, as well as her quietly subversive art.

For nearly sixty years—including as the longstanding artist-in-residence of New York City’s Department of Sanitation—her canvas has been the streets, landfills, and workplaces of New York, uplifting everyday acts of human service—cleaning, maintenance, housework—in collaborative projects that radically shift our view of the value of labor in society.

The daughter of an Orthodox rabbi, Ukeles didn’t find her voice as an artist until the late 1960s, when, as a new mother, she realized that her avant-garde heroes—Duchamp, Rothko, Pollock—“didn’t change diapers.” Insisting on bringing artistic dignity to overlooked acts of caring, including motherhood and sanitation, she penned a feminist rejoinder—a “Maintenance Manifesto”—and embarked on her groundbreaking public art career, revealing the unseen systems of service underpinning modern life.

Director Toby Perl Freilich’s engrossing film uses a playful and inventive visual style to explore Ukeles’ remarkable life and career as a truly atypical, radical artist. Blending never-before-seen archival footage with candid interviews, Maintenance Artist becomes an energetic, insightful portrait of a visionary who reshaped the boundaries of conceptual art. Framed by the rise of feminism, environmental activism, and conceptual art, the film reveals how one woman’s unwavering commitment to elevating everyday labor transformed public space, challenged cultural hierarchies, and redefined what art can be—proving that even the most ordinary acts of care can be revolutionary.