About
Jonas Mekas - filmmaker, film critic, archivist, poet, lecturer and curator - is one of the leading figures of American avant-garde film and video. Born in Lithuania, he immigrated to New York in 1949 after spending time in Nazi forced labor camps and displaced persons camps. In addition to his many narrative and diary films that have screened extensively at festivals and museums around the world, he has worked as editor-in-chief of Film Culture, movie critic for the Village Voice and co-founder of Anthology Film Archives, one of the world's largest and most important repositories of avant-garde films.
Jonas Mekas visited Screening Room in October 1981 to discuss the film preservation efforts of Anthology Film Archives and show and discuss his own work as well as films by other filmmakers, including Bruce Bailie, Maya Deren, and Joseph Cornell.
• All My Life by Bruce Baillie (full film, 2:35)
• Moth Light by Stan Brakhage (full film, 3:13)
• Eureka by Ernie Gehr (full film, 1:23)
• Midnight Parity by Joseph Cornell (full film, 3:08)
• Notebook by Marie Menken (full film with commentary, 10:38)
• Paradise Not Yet Lost by Jonas Mekas (excerpt, 9:35)
• Choreography for Camera by Maya Deren (full film, 2:15)
• Choreography for Camera Outtakes by Maya Deren (footage with commentary, 4:56)
• Color Sequence by Dwinell Grant (full film, 1:58)
Screening Room was a Boston television series that ran for almost ten years from 1972-1981. It offered independent filmmakers a chance to show and discuss their work on a commercial (ABC-TV) affiliate station. The series was developed and hosted by filmmaker Robert Gardner (Dead Birds, Forest of Bliss). Nearly 100 programs were produced during the years Screening Room was broadcast. Twenty seven episodes have been edited for release in 3 categories: Animation, Documentary, and Experimental Film.
Films in the Experimental series