From Andy Warhol to Susan Sontag, filmmaker Jonas Mekas is in conversation at the Peckham Plex on the 10th April 2018.
Avant-gard cinema has giants like all genres of creative arts but one name looms large-Jonas Mekas (born in Lithuania in 1922). This colossus of the New York Avant-gard art scene since the 60’s, has recorded conversations and interviews with the likes of Andy Warhol and Susan Sontag, Yvonne Rainer and Kenneth Anger to name a few, for his weekly column in the Village Voice. Mekas has often been called the ‘godfather of American avant-gard cinema’ and his work has been shown and exhibited in galleries and museums worldwide to critical acclaim.
Mekas is also credited with co-founding the Anthology Film Archive, one of the most important collections of avant-gard film in the world.
The event at Peckham Plex is being organised in partnership with the Lithuanian Culture institute, the Serpentine Galleries and MUBI, and will include an exclusive screening of Mekas’ 2012 film, ‘Outtakes From The Life Of A Happy Man’, and there will be an opportunity to meet him and ask questions about his work and life. MUBI have also announced that they will be screening ‘As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses Of Beauty’, Mekas’ documentary of his life, using home movies gathered over a thirty year period. At 285 minutes long, it is one of the longest experimental movies ever made.
Jonas Mekas has lived a full and varied life and as the title would suggest, a happy and fulfilled one too. At 95, it’s entirely possible that Mekas will be appearing less and less so if you want to see one of the greats, someone who has helped to shape art and filmmaking since the 60s, then come and see him at the Peckham Plex on the 10th April.
