Jonas Mekas
Conversations with Filmmakers
Author(s) Jonas Mekas
Artist(s) Jonas Mekas, Mike Kuchar, George Kuchar, Shirley Clarke, Gregory Markapoulos, Barbara Rubin, Robert Downey
Format Hardcover book, 100 pages of color and black and white photos
Year 2018
Language(s) English
Pages 260 pages
Description
Jonas Mekas, born in Lithuania, arrived in Brooklyn via Germany in 1949 and began making his first films there. Mekas developed a form of filmed diary in which he recorded his daily observations. He became the barometer of the New York art scene and a pioneer of American avant-garde cinema. Every week, from 1958 to 1977, he published his "Movie Journal" column in the Village Voice, conducting numerous interviews with filmmakers from around the world. "Conversations" brings together for the first time these interviews with his filmmaker friends and collaborators in a single volume. Mekas recorded the conversations with his camera. For each interview, he selected a photo or still image from the films shot with his subjects to introduce it. The complete texts are complemented by letters and corresponding script excerpts, and enhanced with an index of the people involved.