Directing
Jonas Mekas
Jonas Mekas (24 December 1922 - 23 January 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.
Filmography
A Mixtape for Stom
Film · 2025
Nam June Paik: Moon Is the Oldest TV
Film · 2023
Film: The Living Record of Our Memory
Film · 2022
Notes for a Déjà vu
Film · 2022
Vertigo
Film · 2022
Jonas Mekas Anthology
Film · 2022
Fragments of Paradise
Film · 2022
Please Leave a Message: Anthology Film Archives Voicemails Through the Ages
Film · 2022
The Velvet Underground
Film · 2021
Back from New York
Film · 2021
The Invisible Father
Film · 2021
9/11: Life Under Attack
Film · 2021
Tapes
Film · 2020
Tiny Tim: King for a Day
Film · 2020
Last Interview Film of Jonas Mekas/version 1
Film · 2019
Cinema and Sanctuary
Film · 2019
Keep singing: a tribute to Jonas Mekas
Film · 2019
Makeshift (for Mekas)
Film · 2019
Gena Rowlands: A Life on Film
Film · 2019
Self Discovery for Social Survival
Film · 2019
Sebastian and Jonas Leaving the Party
Film · 2019
3 Friends Singing (...in the Desert)
Film · 2019
Jonas Towards Broadway
Film · 2019
Elegy for J.M.
Film · 2019
George: The Story of George Maciunas and Fluxus
Film · 2018
Barbara Rubin and the Exploding NY Underground
Film · 2018
Nitsch
Film · 2018
Beyond the Bolex
Film · 2018
I Don't Know Which Tree It Comes From that Fragrance
Film · 2017
On the Holy Spirit
Film · 2016
I Had Nowhere to Go
Film · 2016
Reminiscences of Jonas Mekas
Film · 2016
EXPRMNTL
Film · 2016
Últimas correspondencias
Film · 2016
All About Bolex
Film · 2015
A Report from Venice
Film · 2015
A Day in the Life of Andy Warhol
Film · 2015
Behind the Artist: Andy Warhol, an American Prophet
Film · 2015
Filmstudio, mon amour
Film · 2015
My Birthday
Film · 2014
River of Fundament
Film · 2014
My Conversations on Film
Film · 2013
What Is Cinema?
Film · 2013
Jonas in the Jungle
Film · 2013
Out-Takes from the Life of a Happy Man
Film · 2012
Maya Deren, Take Zero
Film · 2012
Reminiscences from Germany
Film · 2012
Guest
Film · 2011
Free Radicals: A History of Experimental Film
Film · 2011
My Mars Bar Movie
Film · 2011
Re: Maciunas and Fluxus
Film · 2011
Cinematic Correspondences: Jonas Mekas - J.L. Guerin
Film · 2011
3.11 A Sense of Home Films
Film · 2011
Cyclopean 3D: Life with a Beautiful Woman
Film · 2011
Lavender
Film · 2010
Visionaries
Film · 2010
New York Conversations
Film · 2010
Portrait Serie - Jonas Mekas
Film · 2010
The Signing
Film · 2009
The Perfect Team: The Making of 'On the Bowery'
Film · 2009
It Came from Kuchar
Film · 2009
Jonas Mekas in Kodachrome Days
Film · 2009
Doc
Film · 2008
Question a Day
Film · 2008
Andy Warhol's Factory People... Inside the Sixties Silver Factory
Film · 2008
Notes on an American Film Director at Work
Film · 2008
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis
Film · 2007
Tuesday Jan. 9, 2007
Film · 2007
365 Day Project
Film · 2007
Sunday December 30, 2007
Film · 2007
Anger Me
Film · 2006
Notes on Marie Menken
Film · 2006
Salvador Dalí at Work
Film · 2006
Meet The Kuchar Brothers
Film · 2006
Who Gets to Call It Art?
Film · 2006
The Song of Central Park
Film · 2006
Nam June Paik: Lessons from the Video Master
Film · 2006
Jonas' Independence Speech at the Anniversary of the Filmmaker's Cooperative
Film · 2006
Graffiti Museum Bronx, NYC
Film · 2006
End of the Millennium Espresso
Film · 2006
Imperfect Film
Film · 2006
Taping for As I was Moving Ahead…
Film · 2006
Kreutzer Sonata
Film · 2006
The Definition of Insanity
Film · 2005
Excavating Taylor Mead
Film · 2005
Vies et morts d'Andy Warhol
Film · 2005
Notes on Utopia
Film · 2005
A Letter from Greenpoint
Film · 2004
Kulturplatz
Series · 2004
Not in Our Name
Film · 2003
Axiom of Choice
Film · 2003
Jonas Keeps Shooting Around
Film · 2002
In the Mirror of Maya Deren
Film · 2002
Notes in Lifestyle Margins
Film · 2002
A Letter to Penny Arcade
Film · 2001
As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty
Film · 2000
Requiem for a Manual Typewriter
Film · 2000
Laboratorium Anthology
Film · 1999
Letter to John from Jonas
Film · 1999
This Side of Paradise: Fragments of An Unfinished Biography
Film · 1999
My Country is Cinema
Film · 1998
Song of Avignon
Film · 1998
Jonas Mekas in Paris 10/97
Film · 1998
A Poet from the Lower East Side
Film · 1997
Scenes from Allen's Last Three Days on Earth as a Spirit
Film · 1997
Birth of a Nation
Film · 1997
Michael Snow Up Close
Film · 1996
Cinema Is Not 100 Years Old
Film · 1996
Jonas Mekas, Friday 13th October
Film · 1996
Nico Icon
Film · 1995
Jonas in the Desert
Film · 1994
Jonas Mekas in Budapest
Film · 1993
The Misfits - 30 Years of Fluxus
Film · 1993
Zefiro Torna or Scenes from the Life of George Maciunas (Fluxus)
Film · 1992
Award
Film · 1992
Cinématon n°1590 : Jonas Mekas
Film · 1992
Interview and Reading: Jonas Mekas
Film · 1991
Just Visiting This Planet
Film · 1991
Quartet Number One
Film · 1991
Step Across the Border
Film · 1990
Superstar: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol
Film · 1990
Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol: Friendships and Intersections
Film · 1990
Belladonna
Film · 1989
Warhol's Cinema 1963-1968: Mirror for the Sixties
Film · 1989
He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life
Film · 1986
Invocation: Maya Deren
Film · 1986
Fire in the East: A Portrait of Robert Frank
Film · 1986
Home Movies 1971-81
Film · 1985
Persistence of Vision
Film · 1984
Strong Medicine
Film · 1981
The Queen of Sheba Meets the Atom Man
Film · 1981
Travel Songs
Film · 1981
J. Mekas
Film · 1980
No. 18: Mahagonny
Film · 1980
Self-Portrait
Film · 1980
ORG
Film · 1979
Paradise Not Yet Lost
Film · 1979
Notes for Jerome
Film · 1978
Four Shadows
Film · 1978
Cinématon
Film · 1978
Lost, Lost, Lost
Film · 1976
Postcard from America
Film · 1975
‘Rameau’s Nephew’ by Diderot (Thanx to Dennis Young) by Wilma Schoen
Film · 1974
Notes on the Buffalo Conference: “Autobiography in American Independent Cinema”
Film · 1973
Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania
Film · 1972
Going Home
Film · 1972
Imagine
Film · 1972
Journey to Lithuania
Film · 1971
Ricky Leacock Visit, April 15, 1971
Film · 1971
Up Your Legs Forever
Film · 1971
Occhio privato sul nuovo mondo
Film · 1970
Filmmakers
Film · 1969
Jonas
Film · 1968
Underground New York
Film · 1968
A Matter of Baobab
Film · 1968
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
Film · 1968
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
Film · 1968
The Song of Avila
Film · 1967
Poem Posters
Film · 1967
Galaxie
Film · 1966
The Love Merchant
Film · 1966
![Screen Test [ST211]: Jonas Mekas](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimage.tmdb.org%2Ft%2Fp%2Fw500%2F5yEUYxLQWc71aL7OGrhSnpslsQO.jpg&w=3840&q=75)
Screen Test [ST211]: Jonas Mekas
Film · 1966
Shooting Guns
Film · 1966
Jonas in the Brig
Film · 1965
Dirt
Film · 1965
Andy Warhol Screen Tests
Film · 1965
Empire
Film · 1965
Award Presentation to Andy Warhol
Film · 1964
Diane the Zebra Woman
Film · 1962
The Sin of Jesus
Film · 1961
The Lamb
Film
Viva Jonas!
Film
Fragments of an Unfinished Biography of Jackie & Lee
Film