Jonas Mekas
Personal Info
Known For
Directing
Gender
Male
Birthday
1922-12-24
Place of Birth
Semeniškiai, Lithuania
Jonas Mekas
Biography
Jonas Mekas was born in 1922 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.
Also Known For
My Country is Cinema
Jan 01, 1998
Last Interview Film of Jonas Mekas/version 1
Apr 08, 2019
The Velvet Underground
Oct 15, 2021
Film: The Living Record of Our Memory
Aug 12, 2022
Notes for a Déjà vu
Feb 21, 2022
Cinema and Sanctuary
Jun 20, 2019
Strong Medicine
Nov 25, 1981
Persistence of Vision
Jan 01, 1984
All About Bolex
Jan 01, 2015
A Report from Venice
Jun 01, 2015
Nam June Paik: Moon Is the Oldest TV
Mar 24, 2023
Back from New York
Oct 25, 2021
Michael Snow Up Close
Jan 01, 1996
The Signing
Jan 01, 2009
Anger Me
Oct 23, 2006
Lavender
Jun 01, 2010
My Birthday
Dec 23, 2014
Home Movies 1971-81
Jan 01, 1985
Zefiro Torna or Scenes from the Life of George Maciunas (Fluxus)
Dec 31, 1992
As I Was Moving Ahead, Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty
Nov 05, 2000
Out-Takes from the Life of a Happy Man
Dec 01, 2012
A Poet from the Lower East Side
Jan 01, 1997
Belladonna
May 22, 1989
Jonas Keeps Shooting Around
Aug 01, 2002
River of Fundament
Feb 12, 2014
Vertigo
Jul 13, 2022
Galaxie
Sep 03, 1966
Interview and Reading: Jonas Mekas
Jan 01, 1991
Jonas Mekas Anthology
Sep 03, 2022
Fragments of Paradise
Aug 31, 2022
Notes for Jerome
Jul 03, 1978
Please Leave a Message: Anthology Film Archives Voicemails Through the Ages
Sep 21, 2022
The Lamb
J. Mekas
Jan 01, 1980
Occhio privato sul nuovo mondo
Jan 01, 1970
Guest
Mar 25, 2011
Viva Jonas!
Doc
Dec 09, 2008
Just Visiting This Planet
Sep 05, 1991
Jonas
Jan 01, 1968
Maya Deren, Take Zero
Jan 30, 2012
The Perfect Team: The Making of 'On the Bowery'
Jan 01, 2009
Four Shadows
Oct 03, 1978
Diane the Zebra Woman
Jan 01, 1962
On the Holy Spirit
Oct 22, 2016
I Had Nowhere to Go
Aug 04, 2016
In the Mirror of Maya Deren
Mar 15, 2002
Reminiscences from Germany
Jan 01, 2012
The Song of Avila
Dec 31, 1967
He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life
Feb 22, 1986
Step Across the Border
Sep 08, 1990
Scenes from Allen's Last Three Days on Earth as a Spirit
Jul 03, 1997
The Definition of Insanity
Dec 10, 2005
I Don't Know Which Tree It Comes From that Fragrance
Sep 01, 2017
The Queen of Sheba Meets the Atom Man
Aug 01, 1981
The Love Merchant
Jan 01, 1966
Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania
Aug 30, 1996
Notes on Marie Menken
Apr 20, 2006
Going Home
Oct 04, 1972
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis
Apr 11, 2007
Salvador Dalí at Work
Nov 11, 2006
No. 18: Mahagonny
Sep 13, 1980
Jonas in the Brig
Sep 10, 1965
Underground New York
Jan 01, 1968
ORG
Aug 31, 1979
Self-Portrait
Jun 07, 1980
Tuesday Jan. 9, 2007
Jan 09, 2007
My Conversations on Film
Oct 13, 2013
Meet The Kuchar Brothers
Jan 01, 2006
Jonas in the Desert
Jan 01, 1994
Free Radicals: A History of Experimental Film
Jul 24, 2011
‘Rameau’s Nephew’ by Diderot (Thanx to Dennis Young) by Wilma Schoen
Nov 05, 1974
Filmmakers
Jan 01, 1969
Cinema Is Not 100 Years Old
Jan 01, 1996
Journey to Lithuania
Jan 01, 1971
Laboratorium Anthology
Jan 01, 1999
Invocation: Maya Deren
Apr 24, 1986
It Came from Kuchar
Sep 22, 2009
Visionaries
Jan 01, 2010
Award Presentation to Andy Warhol
Sep 03, 1965
New York Conversations
Sep 21, 2010
George: The Story of George Maciunas and Fluxus
Feb 21, 2018
Warhol's Cinema 1963-1968: Mirror for the Sixties
Jan 01, 1989
What Is Cinema?
Sep 06, 2013
Question a Day
Jan 01, 2008
Letter to John from Jonas
Mar 06, 1999
Requiem for a Manual Typewriter
Feb 09, 2000
Portrait Serie - Jonas Mekas
Oct 14, 2010
Keep singing: a tribute to Jonas Mekas
Jan 31, 2019
Barbara Rubin and the Exploding NY Underground
May 02, 2018
Poem Posters
May 19, 1967
Excavating Taylor Mead
Oct 08, 2005
A Letter from Greenpoint
Apr 22, 2004
A Matter of Baobab
Jan 01, 1970
Makeshift (for Mekas)
May 25, 2019
TO NEW YORK WITH LOVE - A Letter to Penny Arcade June 25, 2001
Jun 23, 2001
Gena Rowlands: A Life on Film
Jun 05, 2019
Self Discovery for Social Survival
Jun 15, 2019
Nitsch
Jan 29, 2018
Dirt
Sep 25, 1965
A Day in the Life of Andy Warhol
Aug 25, 2015
Jonas Mekas in Kodachrome Days
Dec 31, 2009
Award
Jan 01, 1992
Andy Warhol Screen Tests
Nov 28, 1965
Nico Icon
Sep 08, 1995
Superstar: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol
Jul 18, 1990
Who Gets to Call It Art?
Feb 01, 2006
Sebastian and Jonas Leaving the Party
Nov 03, 2019
My Mars Bar Movie
Oct 06, 2011
Imagine
Dec 23, 1972
Cinématon
Dec 20, 1978
Andy Warhol's Factory People... Inside the Sixties Silver Factory
Jan 01, 2008
Paradise Not Yet Lost
Jul 03, 1979
Beyond the Bolex
Nov 08, 2018
365 Day Project
Dec 31, 2007
Empire
Mar 06, 1965
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
Nov 23, 2013
Lost, Lost, Lost
Sep 14, 1976
Re: Maciunas and Fluxus
Jan 01, 2011
Song of Avignon
Jul 03, 1998
Quartet Number One
Jul 03, 1991
Jonas Mekas, Friday 13th October
Dec 31, 1996
Screen Test [ST211]: Jonas Mekas
Dec 31, 1966
Not in Our Name
Dec 31, 2003
Notes on an American Film Director at Work
Jan 01, 2008
The Song of Central Park
Nov 11, 2006
Cinematic Correspondences: Jonas Mekas - J.L. Guerin
Apr 09, 2011
Tapes
Sep 14, 2020
Postcard from America
Jan 01, 1975
3.11 A Sense of Home Films
Sep 11, 2011
Elegy for J.M.
Dec 16, 2019
Jonas Towards Broadway
Jan 01, 2019
3 Friends Singing (...in the Desert)
Jan 01, 2019
Axiom of Choice
Jan 01, 2003
Reminiscences of Jonas Mekas
May 29, 2016
Tiny Tim: King for a Day
Aug 20, 2020
Cinématon n°1590 : Jonas Mekas
Fire in the East: A Portrait of Robert Frank
Jan 01, 1986
EXPRMNTL
Oct 08, 2016
The Sin of Jesus
Dec 10, 1961
The Invisible Father
Mar 19, 2021
Sunday December 30, 2007
Dec 30, 2007
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
Nov 23, 2013
Notes in Lifestyle Margins
Mar 11, 2002
Jonas Mekas in Budapest
Nov 01, 1993
Vies et morts d'Andy Warhol
Nov 25, 2005
Nam June Paik: Lessons from the Video Master
Jan 01, 2006
Behind the Artist: Andy Warhol, an American Prophet
Jun 19, 2015
RAHHH
Sean
The Misfits - 30 Years of Fluxus
