In Without Gorky (2011), the artist's granddaughter, Cosima Spender, directs her filmmaking skills to explore her own family.

Ashile Gorky (1904-1948) was a survivor of the Armenian Genocide, who, after his mother died of starvation, made his way to the US, changed his name and began to study art and develop his own style of abstract expressionism.

The last years of Ashile's life were difficult and therefore difficult for his young wife, Agnes Magruder, who endured the man's mood swings and likekly violence.

After Ashile killed himself, Agnes sent her 2 young daughters off to boarding school in Switzerland for 6 months while she traveled Europe. Natasha was only 3 and still angry with her mother 63 years later about being abandoned, such was the impact.