Jonas Mekas - A Camera for Jonas

After the exhibition Voilà in 2000, a retrospective of Jonas Mekas archives, the museum proposes, from 2nd July to 28th September 2003, new projects of the artist.

Born in Lituania, living in New York since 1949, Jonas Mekas made his name filming his neighborhood in Brooklyn, the meeting place of European expatriates. Increasing the shots, he elaborates, a new cinema/film genre: "the diary-film", based on the absence of production, without adaptation of the subject, of time, of place.

"Expatriate-traveler" as he defines himself, his life joins the activities of the underground American cinema, besides Andy Warhol, Paul Morrissey, Stanley Brakhage and Len Lye.  Film-maker but also planner and film critic, he founds in 1970 the "Anthology Film Archives", a film theater which gathers classic or avant-garde movies, among which a lot of ignored masterpieces of independent cinema. His committed position denounces in different publications - Film Culture, The Village Voice - the Hollywood movies and stands up for all alternatives forms of cinema.

For the exhibition, Jonas Mekas presents three new works : - Travels, five movies 16mm transferred in DVD, realized in Avila, in Assisi, in Italia, in Moscow and in Stockholm. - "To Petrarca who walked over the hills of Provence" constitutes "a sound diary" of 51 snatches, recorded on different occasions. It echoes to the "diary-film" .  - Dedication to Fernand Léger, tributes to a Fernand Léger project of 1933. From personal archives the artist realized a 24 hours movie about the life of an ordinary couple.

In the annex of the permanent collections (ground floor of the museum) is presented My Night Life. This work, in 20 panels, is the diary of the dreams he transcribed from July 1978 to July 1979 and for what he entrusts the illustrations to Auguste Varkalis (painter, musician and film-maker, born in Lituania).

Artist Book The artist book published for this event gather postcards, notes, drawings and letters received by the artist. Price: 20 euros  96 pages  140 x 225 mm  Black & white and cover in color ISBN : 291 5359016 Published by onestar press

The realization of this exhibition was made possible thanks to the generous participation of : - Epson - agnès b Pressetext

Jonas Mekas - A Camera for Jonas
Kuratoren: Hans Ulrich Obrist & Angeline Scherf