Filmed over nearly three years, WASTE LAND follows renowned artist Vik Muniz as he journeys from his home base in Brooklyn to his native Brazil and the world’s largest garbage dump, Jardim Gramacho, located on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. There he photographs an eclectic band of “catadores”—self-designated pickers of recyclable materials. Muniz’s initial objective was to “paint” the catadores with garbage. However, his collaboration with these inspiring characters as they recreate photographic images of themselves out of garbage reveals both the dignity and despair of the catadores as they begin to re-imagine their lives. Director Lucy Walker (DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND, BLINDSIGHT, COUNTDOWN TO ZERO) has great access to the entire process and, in the end, offers stirring evidence of the transformative power of art and the alchemy of the human spirit.Lucy Walker’s “Waste Land” is an inspiring account of the hardscrabble lives of catadores (i.e. pickers), Brazilians who scrape an honest living out of an ocean of trash outside Rio de Janeiro, and how an artist and his art changed them.

Walker charts the quest of Brazilian artist Vik Muniz, who grew up poor in Sao Paulo and whose organic works include a set of so-called “sugar portraits” of the children of Caribbean plantation workers. Muniz wants to do more than make art. He wants to change the lives of the catadores. To do so, Muniz took on a two-year challenge to work among the pickers in a wilderness of blue plastic bags and make portraits of them out of various recyclable materials. “Waste Land,” a by-product, finds something unexpected in the largest landfill on the planet: proud workers who have organized to get their roads paved and a sewage system. His wife however seems less than thrilled at his latest project and is justly concerned about the hazards. Muniz, meanwhile, exudes missionarylike zeal.

What he discovers in Jardim Gramacho (“Jardim” means “gardens”) is that lives already have been transformed by the dignity bestowed upon workers by their labors. For the women workers, including one beauty aptly named Isis, who come from the favelas, the only viable alternative to picking is prostitution. For the men, the benefits are similar. Their work gives them hope, makes it possible for them to dream, usually about better lives for their children, gives them a desire to better themselves and provides a moral compass. Being turned into modern art hanging on the walls of museums gives them an even greater impetus to improve their lives. Walker is especially good at letting us see how individual pickers respond to Muniz and his work and how truly transformative the experience is for all of them. One picker named Tiao, a workers’ organizer, ends up dreaming of running for president. “Waste Land” has some things in common with “The Gleaners & I,” Agnes Varda’s wonderful 2000 nonfiction film about French field workers. But “Waste Land” goes even further.

Not rated. In English and Portuguese with subtitles.