Jonas Mekas
Directing
Jonas Mekas (12-24-1922 - 1-23-2019) was born in the farming village of Semeniškiai, Lithuania. In 1944, he and his brother Adolfas were taken by the Nazis to a forced labor camp in Elmshorn, Germany. After the War he studied philosophy at the University of Mainz. At the end of 1949 the UN Refugee Organization brought both brothers to New York City, where they settled down in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Two months after his arrival in New York he borrowed money to buy his first Bolex camera and began to record brief moments of his life. He soon got deeply involved in the American Avant-Garde film movement. In 1954, together with his brother, he started Film Culture magazine, which soon became the most important film publication in the US. In 1958 he began his legendary Movie Journal column in the Village Voice. In 1962 he founded the Film-Makers' Cooperative, and in 1964 the Film-Makers' Cinematheque, which eventually grew into Anthology Film Archives, one of the world's largest and most important repositories of avant-garde cinema, and a screening venue. During all this time he continued writing poetry and making films. To this date he has published more than 20 books of prose and poetry, which have been translated into over a dozen languages. His Lithuanian poetry is now part of Lithuanian classic literature and his films can be found in leading museums around the world. He is largely credited for developing the diaristic forms of cinema. Mekas has also been active as an academic, teaching at the New School for Social Research, the International Center for Photography, Cooper Union, New York University, and MIT. Mekas' film The Brig was awarded the Grand Prize at the Venice Film Festival in 1963. Other films include Walden (1969), Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1972), Lost Lost Lost (1975), Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol (1990), Scenes from the Life of George Maciunas (1992), As I was Moving Ahead I saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty (2000), Letter from Greenpoint (2005), Sleepless Nights Stories (2011) and Out-takes from the Life of a Happy Man. In 2007, he completed a series of 365 short films released on the internet -- one film every day -- and since then has continued to share new work on his website. Since 2000, Mekas has expanded his work into the area of film installations, exhibiting at the Serpentine Gallery, the Centre Pompidou, Musée d'Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, the Moderna Museet (Stockholm), PS1 Contemporary Art Center MoMA, Documenta of Kassel, the Museum Ludwig in Cologne, the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, and the Venice Biennale.
A Mixtape for Stom
Nam June Paik: Moon Is the Oldest TV
Self (archive footage)
Please Leave a Message: Anthology Film Archives Voicemails Through the Ages
Jonas Mekas Anthology
Jonas Mekas
Fragments of Paradise
Self (archive footage)
Film: The Living Record of Our Memory
Self
Vertigo
Notes for a Déjà vu
Back from New York
Himself
The Velvet Underground
Self
The Invisible Father
Self (archive footage)
Tapes
Tiny Tim: King for a Day
Himself
Elegy for J.M.
Sebastian and Jonas Leaving the Party
Cinema and Sanctuary
Self
Self Discovery for Social Survival
Narrator (voice)
Gena Rowlands: A Life on Film
Self
Makeshift (for Mekas)
Last Interview Film of Jonas Mekas/version 1
Self
Keep singing: a tribute to Jonas Mekas
Jonas Towards Broadway
3 Friends Singing (...in the Desert)
Beyond the Bolex
Self
Barbara Rubin and the Exploding NY Underground
George: The Story of George Maciunas and Fluxus
Self
Nitsch
I Don't Know Which Tree It Comes From that Fragrance
Self
On the Holy Spirit
EXPRMNTL
himself
I Had Nowhere to Go
Himself
Reminiscences of Jonas Mekas
Self
Últimas correspondencias
Self
Filmstudio, mon amour
Sé stesso
A Day in the Life of Andy Warhol
Self
Behind the Artist: Andy Warhol, an American Prophet
A Report from Venice
All About Bolex
My Birthday
River of Fundament
Wake Guest
My Conversations on Film
Himself
Jonas in the Jungle
Self
What Is Cinema?
Self
Out-Takes from the Life of a Happy Man
Jonas Mekas
Maya Deren, Take Zero
Himself
Reminiscences from Germany
Himself
My Mars Bar Movie
himself
3.11 A Sense of Home Films
Himself (voice) (segment "Mt. Ventoux")
Free Radicals: A History of Experimental Film
Himself
Cinematic Correspondences: Jonas Mekas - J.L. Guerin
Himself
Guest
Self
Re: Maciunas and Fluxus
Portrait Serie - Jonas Mekas
himself
New York Conversations
Lavender
Self
Visionaries
Himself
Jonas Mekas in Kodachrome Days
Himself
It Came from Kuchar
Self (archive footage)
The Perfect Team: The Making of 'On the Bowery'
Self
The Signing
Doc
Himself
Notes on an American Film Director at Work
Self
Andy Warhol's Factory People... Inside the Sixties Silver Factory
Question a Day
365 Day Project
Self
Sunday December 30, 2007
Self
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis
Self
Tuesday Jan. 9, 2007
Self
The Song of Central Park
Himself (voice)
Salvador Dalí at Work
Self
Anger Me
Himself
Notes on Marie Menken
Self
Who Gets to Call It Art?
Self
Nam June Paik: Lessons from the Video Master
Self
Meet The Kuchar Brothers
The Definition of Insanity
Vies et morts d'Andy Warhol
Excavating Taylor Mead
Self
A Letter from Greenpoint
Mekas
Not in Our Name
himself
Axiom of Choice
Self
Jonas Keeps Shooting Around
Himself
In the Mirror of Maya Deren
Himself
Notes in Lifestyle Margins
A Letter to Penny Arcade
As I Was Moving Ahead, Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty
Narrator (voice)
Requiem for a Manual Typewriter
Himself
Letter to John from Jonas
Laboratorium Anthology
Himself
Jonas Mekas in Paris 10/97
Song of Avignon
Self
My Country is Cinema
Self
Scenes from Allen's Last Three Days on Earth as a Spirit
Self
A Poet from the Lower East Side
Self
Jonas Mekas, Friday 13th October
Himself
Cinema Is Not 100 Years Old
Himself
Michael Snow Up Close
Himself
Nico Icon
Self
Jonas in the Desert
Self
Jonas Mekas in Budapest
Himself
Zefiro Torna or Scenes from the Life of George Maciunas (Fluxus)
Award
Himself
Just Visiting This Planet
Quartet Number One
Interview and Reading: Jonas Mekas
Himself
Superstar: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol
Self
Step Across the Border
Butterfly Wing
Belladonna
Warhol's Cinema 1963-1968: Mirror for the Sixties
Self
Invocation: Maya Deren
Himself
He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life
Self (archive footage)
Fire in the East: A Portrait of Robert Frank
Self
Home Movies 1971-81
Persistence of Vision
Self
Strong Medicine
The Queen of Sheba Meets the Atom Man
No. 18: Mahagonny
Self
Self-Portrait
Himself
J. Mekas
Self
ORG
Self (archive footage)
Paradise Not Yet Lost
Himself
Cinématon
N°1590
Four Shadows
Notes for Jerome
Self
Lost, Lost, Lost
Self
Postcard from America
‘Rameau’s Nephew’ by Diderot (Thanx to Dennis Young) by Wilma Schoen
Notes on the Buffalo Conference: “Autobiography in American Independent Cinema”
Imagine
Self
Going Home
Himself
Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania
Self
Ricky Leacock Visit, April 15, 1971
Self
Journey to Lithuania
Himself
Occhio privato sul nuovo mondo
Filmmakers
Himself
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
self
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
Self
A Matter of Baobab
Underground New York
Self
Jonas
Himself
The Song of Avila
Narrator
Poem Posters
Self
![Screen Test [ST211]: Jonas Mekas](https://image.tmdb.org/t/p/w92/5yEUYxLQWc71aL7OGrhSnpslsQO.jpg)
Screen Test [ST211]: Jonas Mekas
himself
Galaxie
Self
Shooting Guns
The Love Merchant
Lounge Patron
Andy Warhol Screen Tests
Self
Dirt
Jonas in the Brig
Himself
Empire
Self (uncredited)
Award Presentation to Andy Warhol
Self
Diane the Zebra Woman
The Sin of Jesus