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Jonas Mekas
Born · December 24, 1922
Died · January 23, 2019 (96 years old)
Known For: Directing
Place of Birth: Semeniškiai, Lithuania
Bio
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.
Nam June Paik: Moon Is the Oldest TV
Self (archive footage)
6.9
2023
Please Leave a Message: Anthology Film Archives Voicemails Through the Ages
0.0
2022
Jonas Mekas Anthology
Jonas Mekas
0.0
2022
Fragments of Paradise
Self (archive footage)
6.7
2022
Film: The Living Record of Our Memory
Self
8.6
2022
Vertigo
0.0
2022
Notes for a Déjà vu
0.0
2022
Back from New York
Himself
0.0
2021
The Velvet Underground
Self
6.8
2021
The Invisible Father
Self (archive footage)
0.0
2021
Tapes
0.0
2020
Tiny Tim: King for a Day
Himself
6.1
2020
Elegy for J.M.
0.0
2019
Sebastian and Jonas Leaving the Party
0.0
2019
Cinema and Sanctuary
Self
0.0
2019
Self Discovery for Social Survival
Narrator (voice)
5.4
2019
Gena Rowlands: A Life on Film
Self
7.2
2019
Makeshift (for Mekas)
6.0
2019
Last Interview Film of Jonas Mekas/version 1
Self
0.0
2019
Keep singing: a tribute to Jonas Mekas
0.0
2019
3 Friends Singing (...in the Desert)
0.0
2019
Jonas Towards Broadway
0.0
2019
Beyond the Bolex
Self
7.0
2018
Barbara Rubin and the Exploding NY Underground
0.0
2018
George: The Story of George Maciunas and Fluxus
Self
7.0
2018
Nitsch
0.0
2018
EXPRMNTL
himself
0.0
2016
Reminiscences of Jonas Mekas
Self
0.0
2016
A Day in the Life of Andy Warhol
Self
5.0
2015
A Report from Venice
0.0
2015
All About Bolex
0.0
2015
My Birthday
6.0
2014
River of Fundament
Wake Guest
6.6
2014
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
Self
7.5
2013
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
self
7.5
2013
What Is Cinema?
Self
6.4
2013
Out-Takes from the Life of a Happy Man
Jonas Mekas
6.5
2012
3.11 A Sense of Home
Himself (voice) (segment "Mt. Ventoux")
6.5
2011
My Mars Bar Movie
himself
0.0
2011
Cinematic Correspondences: Jonas Mekas - J.L. Guerin
Himself
7.0
2011
Guest
Self
6.0
2011
Re: Maciunas and Fluxus
0.0
2011
Portrait Serie - Jonas Mekas
himself
0.0
2010
New York Conversations
0.0
2010
Lavender
Self
0.0
2010
Visionaries
Himself
6.0
2010
Jonas Mekas in Kodachrome Days
Himself
6.5
2009
It Came from Kuchar
Self (archive footage)
7.0
2009
The Signing
0.0
2009
Question a Day
0.0
2008
Andy Warhol's Factory People... Inside the Sixties Silver Factory
3.5
2008
Notes on an American Film Director at Work
Self
5.6
2008
365 Day Project
Self
10.0
2007
Sunday December 30, 2007
Self
0.0
2007
The Song of Central Park
Himself (voice)
0.0
2006
Anger Me
Himself
8.8
2006
Who Gets to Call It Art?
Self
6.7
2006
Excavating Taylor Mead
Self
0.0
2005
Kulturplatz
Self · (1 episode)
6.0
2004
A Letter from Greenpoint
Mekas
0.0
2004
Not in Our Name
himself
0.0
2003
Axiom of Choice
Self
0.0
2003
Jonas Keeps Shooting Around
Himself
5.0
2002
Notes in Lifestyle Margins
0.0
2002
TO NEW YORK WITH LOVE - A Letter to Penny Arcade June 25, 2001
6.0
2001
As I Was Moving Ahead, Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty
Narrator (voice)
7.8
2000
Requiem for a Manual Typewriter
Himself
0.0
2000
Letter to John from Jonas
0.0
1999
Laboratorium Anthology
Himself
0.0
1999
Song of Avignon
Self
7.6
1998
My Country is Cinema
Self
0.0
1998
A Poet from the Lower East Side
Self
0.0
1997
Jonas Mekas, Friday 13th October
Himself
0.0
1996
Michael Snow Up Close
Himself
6.0
1996
Nico Icon
Himself
7.5
1995
Zefiro Torna or Scenes from the Life of George Maciunas (Fluxus)
5.8
1992
Award
Himself
0.0
1992
Quartet Number One
7.5
1991
Interview and Reading: Jonas Mekas
Himself
0.0
1991
Superstar: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol
Self
7.3
1990
Belladonna
0.0
1989
Warhol's Cinema 1963-1968: Mirror for the Sixties
Self
0.0
1989
Invocation: Maya Deren
Himself
5.0
1986
Fire in the East: A Portrait of Robert Frank
Self
0.0
1986
Home Movies 1971-81
0.0
1985
Persistence of Vision
Self
0.0
1984
Strong Medicine
5.6
1981
J. Mekas
Self
0.0
1980
Paradise Not Yet Lost
Himself
0.0
1979
Cinématon
N°1590
4.3
1978
Notes for Jerome
Self
0.0
1978
Lost, Lost, Lost
Self
7.0
1976
Postcard from America
0.0
1975
Imagine
Self
7.0
1972
Journey to Lithuania
Himself
0.0
1971
Occhio privato sul nuovo mondo
0.0
1970
A Matter of Baobab
0.0
1970
Poem Posters
Self
0.0
1967
![Screen Test [ST211]: Jonas Mekas](https://image.tmdb.org/t/p/w154/5yEUYxLQWc71aL7OGrhSnpslsQO.jpg){kind=small}
Screen Test [ST211]: Jonas Mekas
himself
0.0
1966
Galaxie
Self
0.0
1966
The Lamb
Self
0.0
Viva Jonas!
Himself
0.0
I Don't Know Which Tree It Comes From that Fragrance
Self
8.0
2017
On the Holy Spirit
0.0
2016
I Had Nowhere to Go
Himself
0.0
2016
My Conversations on Film
Himself
3.2
2013
Maya Deren, Take Zero
Himself
5.0
2012
Reminiscences from Germany
Himself
0.0
2012
Free Radicals: A History of Experimental Film
Himself
6.7
2011
The Perfect Team: The Making of 'On the Bowery'
Self
0.0
2009
Doc
Himself
0.0
2008
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis
Self
6.6
2007
Tuesday Jan. 9, 2007
Self
0.0
2007
Salvador Dalí at Work
Self
5.0
2006
Notes on Marie Menken
Self
5.4
2006
Meet The Kuchar Brothers
0.0
2006
The Definition of Insanity
10.0
2005
In the Mirror of Maya Deren
Himself
7.4
2002
Scenes from Allen's Last Three Days on Earth as a Spirit
Self
5.2
1997
Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania
Self
6.9
1996
Cinema Is Not 100 Years Old
Himself
0.0
1996
Jonas in the Desert
Self
5.5
1994
Just Visiting This Planet
0.0
1991
Step Across the Border
Butterfly Wing
7.9
1990
He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life
Self (archive footage)
8.2
1986
The Queen of Sheba Meets the Atom Man
6.0
1981
No. 18: Mahagonny
Self
5.5
1980
Self-Portrait
Himself
0.0
1980
ORG
Self (archive footage)
5.3
1979
Four Shadows
7.0
1978
‘Rameau’s Nephew’ by Diderot (Thanx to Dennis Young) by Wilma Schoen
7.9
1974
Going Home
Himself
5.4
1972
Filmmakers
Himself
0.0
1969
Jonas
Himself
0.0
1968
Underground New York
Self
0.0
1968
The Song of Avila
Narrator
6.4
1967
The Love Merchant
Lounge Patron
4.9
1966
Andy Warhol Screen Tests
Self
8.0
1965
Dirt
8.0
1965
Jonas in the Brig
Himself
0.0
1965
Award Presentation to Andy Warhol
Self
7.0
1965
Empire
Self (uncredited)
4.2
1965
Diane the Zebra Woman
9.0
1962
Cinématon n°1590 : Jonas Mekas
0.0
The Sin of Jesus
4.8
1961