Jonas Mekas - Misplaced Pages

Lithuanian-American filmmaker (1922–2019)

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Jonas Mekas
Mekas in 1971
Born	(1922-12-24)December 24, 1922 Semeniškiai, Lithuania
Died	January 23, 2019(2019-01-23) (aged 96) New York City, U.S.
Nationality	Lithuanian-American
Alma mater	University of Mainz
Occupations	Poet filmmaker artist
Years active	1954–2019
Movement	Avant-garde cinema
Spouse	Hollis Melton (m. 1974)
Children	2
Awards	Lithuanian National Prize (1995)
Signature

Jonas Mekas (/ˈmiːkɑːs/; Lithuanian: [ˈjonɐs ˈmækɐs]; December 24, 1922 – January 23, 2019) was a Lithuanian-American filmmaker, poet, and artist who has been called "the godfather of American avant-garde cinema". Mekas's work has been exhibited in museums and at festivals worldwide. Mekas was active in New York City, where he co-founded Anthology Film Archives, The Film-Makers' Cooperative, and the journal Film Culture. He was also the first film critic for The Village Voice.

In the 1960s, Mekas launched anti-censorship campaigns in defense of the LGBTQ-themed films of Jean Genet and Jack Smith, garnering support from cultural figures including Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Norman Mailer, and Susan Sontag. Mekas mentored and supported many prominent artists and filmmakers, including Ken Jacobs, Peter Bogdanovich, Chantal Akerman, Richard Foreman, John Waters, Barbara Rubin, Yoko Ono, and Martin Scorsese. He helped launch the writing careers of the critics Andrew Sarris, Amy Taubin, and J. Hoberman.

During World War II, Mekas edited and contributed to two far-right, collaborationist newspapers under the Nazi occupation of Lithuania, the significance of which has been debated by historians.

His major films include The Brig (1964), Walden: Diaries Notes and Sketches (1968), and Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1972). His early poetry collection, Idylls of Semeniskiai (1948), is a celebrated work in his native Lithuania.

Early life

Mekas was born in Semeniškiai, the son of Elzbieta (Jašinskaitė) and Povilas Mekas on December 24, 1922. As a teenager, he attended the Biržai Gymnasium in Biržai, Lithuania. From 1941 to 1942, living under Nazi occupation, he co-edited and published in the culture section of Naujosios Biržų žinios, founded by the far-right, anti-semitic Lithuanian Activist Front. From 1943 to 1944, he co-edited and published in the culture section of Panevėžio apygardos balsas, a weekly local newspaper published by the fascist Lithuanian Nationalist Party [lt].

In 1944, Mekas left Lithuania with his brother, Adolfas Mekas. They attempted to reach neutral Switzerland by means of Vienna, with fabricated student papers arranged by their uncle. Their train was stopped in Germany, and they were both imprisoned in a labor camp in Elmshorn, a suburb of Hamburg, for eight months. The brothers escaped and hid on a farm near the Danish border for two months until the end of the war. After the war, Mekas lived in displaced persons' camps in Wiesbaden and Kassel. From 1946 to 1948, he studied philosophy at the University of Mainz. By the end of 1949 his brother and he had both secured sponsorship through a job in Chicago and emigrated to the United States. When they arrived, the two decided to settle in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Two weeks after his arrival, he borrowed money to buy his first Bolex 16mm camera and began recording moments of his life.

He discovered avant-garde film at venues such as Amos Vogel's pioneering Cinema 16, and he began curating avant-garde film screenings at Gallery East on Avenue A and Houston Street and at the Film Forum series at Carl Fisher Auditorium on 57th Street.

Career

In 1954, Mekas and his brother Adolfas founded the journal Film Culture, and in 1958 he began writing his "Movie Journal" column for The Village Voice. In 1962, he co-founded The Film-Makers' Cooperative, and in 1964 the Filmmakers' Cinematheque, which eventually became Anthology Film Archives, one of the world's largest and most important repositories of avant-garde film. Along with Lionel Rogosin, he was part of the New American Cinema movement. He was a close collaborator with artists such as Marie Menken, Andy Warhol, Nico, Allen Ginsberg, Yoko Ono, John Lennon, Salvador Dalí, and fellow Lithuanian George Maciunas.

After leaving The Voice over an editorial dispute, for a short time he wrote a column for The SoHo Weekly News.

Mekas gave the film Heaven and Earth Magic its title in 1964/65.

In 1964, Mekas was arrested on obscenity charges for showing Flaming Creatures (1963) and Jean Genet's Un Chant d'Amour (1950). He launched a campaign against the censorship board, and for the next few years continued to exhibit films at the Filmmakers' Cinematheque, the Jewish Museum, and the Gallery of Modern Art. From 1964 to 1967, he organized the New American Cinema Expositions, which toured Europe and South America, and in 1966 joined the 80 Wooster Fluxhouse Coop.

In 1970, Anthology Film Archives opened on 425 Lafayette Street as a film museum, screening space, and library, with Mekas as its director. Mekas, along with Stan Brakhage, Ken Kelman, Peter Kubelka, James Broughton, and P. Adams Sitney, began the ambitious Essential Cinema project at Anthology Film Archives to establish a canon of important cinematic works. Mekas's legs appeared in John Lennon and Yoko Ono's experimental film Up Your Legs Forever (1971).

As a filmmaker, Mekas's own output ranged from his early narrative film Guns of the Trees (1961) to "diary films" such as Walden (1969); Lost, Lost, Lost (1975), Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1972), Zefiro Torna (1992), and As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty (2000), which have been screened at festivals and museums around the world. Mekas' diary films offered a new perspective to the genre and portrayed the cinematic avant-garde scene of the 1960s.

Mekas expanded the scope of his practice with his later works of multi-monitor installations, sound immersion pieces and "frozen-film" prints. Together they offer a new experience of his classic films and a novel presentation of his more recent video work. His work has been exhibited at the 51st Venice Biennial, PS1 Contemporary Art Center, the Ludwig Museum, the Serpentine Gallery, the Jewish Museum, and the Jonas Mekas Visual Arts Center.

In 2007, Mekas released one film every day on his website, a project he entitled "The 365 Day Project." The online diary is still ongoing on Jonas Mekas's official website. It was celebrated in 2015 with a show titled "The Internet Saga" which was curated by Francesco Urbano Ragazzi at Palazzo Foscari Contarini on the occasion of the 56th Venice Biennale of Visual Arts.

Beginning in the 1970s, Mekas taught film courses at the New School for Social Research, MIT, Cooper Union, and New York University.

Additionally, Mekas was a writer and published his poems and prose in Lithuanian, French, German, and English. His work has been translated into English by the Lithuanian-American poet Vyt Bakaitis in such collections as Daybooks: 1970-1972 (Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs, 2003) and a bilingual anthology of modern Lithuanian verse, Gyvas atodūsis/Breathing Free, poems (Lietuvos, 2001). Mekas published many of his journals and diaries, including I Had Nowhere to Go: Diaries, 1944–1954 and Letters from Nowhere, as well as articles on film criticism, theory, and technique. In 2007, the Jonas Mekas Visual Arts Center was opened in Vilnius.

One of Mekas's last exhibitions, "Notes from Downtown," took place at James Fuentes Gallery on the Lower East Side in 2018. Mekas's last work, Requiem, premiered posthumously at The Shed in New York City on November 1, 2019. The 84-minute video was commissioned by The Shed and Festspielhaus Baden-Baden. It screened in tandem with a performance of Verdi's Requiem, conducted by Teodor Currentzis and performed by the musicAeterna orchestra.

In 2018, Ina Navazelskis, an oral historian at the National Institute for Holocaust Documentation, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum interviewed Mekas for their Jeff and Toby Herr Oral History Archive. There, he discussed his memories of World War II

"Jonas Mekas: The Camera Was Always Running", the filmmaker's first retrospective in the United States, was organized by Guest Curator Kelly Taxter and on view at the Jewish Museum in the spring of 2022.

German filmmaker Peter Sempel has made three films about Mekas' works and life, Jonas in the Desert (1991), Jonas at the Ocean (2004), and Jonas in the Jungle (2013).

Personal life

Mekas married Hollis Melton in 1974. They had two children, a daughter, Oona, and a son, Sebastian. His family is featured in Jonas's films, including Out-takes from the Life of a Happy Man and As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty.

Mekas died at his home in Brooklyn on January 23, 2019, at the age of 96.

Mekas is the subject of a documentary, Fragments of Paradise, which premiered at the 2022 Venice Film Festival. The film received the award for Best Documentary on Cinema at the Festival.

Controversy over World War II activities

Mekas long maintained that, while working for local newspapers, he also clandestinely-transcribed BBC broadcasts in support of the underground. In 2018, an article in the New York Review of Books by historian Michael Casper challenged Mekas's versions of his wartime activities. Casper claims that Mekas participated "in an underground movement in Biržai that supported the 1941 Nazi invasion of Soviet Lithuania" and worked for "two ultranationalist and Nazi propaganda newspapers, until he fled Lithuania in 1944." Casper noted that Mekas's publications in these newspapers were not anti-Semitic.

At the time, art critic and historian Barry Schwabsky penned a letter to the editor criticizing Casper's essay. He and Casper had an exchange of letters in the New York Review of Books. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's website biography of Mekas maintains that he participated in both the anti-Soviet and anti-Nazi undergrounds. Following the 2022 exhibition at the Jewish Museum in New York, Casper published an article entitled "World War II Revisionism at the Jewish Museum" in Jewish Currents. There, he argued that the "art world at large remains deeply invested in the story of Mekas the anti-Nazi", thus perpetuating revisionism not only erasing his roles, but casting him as an anti-Nazi hero.

In an article for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Casper's charges against the Jewish Museum, journalist Asaf Shalev also pointed out that two different memos were circulated among the museum employees to dismiss Casper's article. Kelly Taxter, the guest curator of the exhibit, responded to Casper's historical research by saying that "the tone of these emails is often aggressive." This was based on emails shared by the Mekas family, which Shalev also had access to, although Shalev wrote that "Nothing on there looked to me like Casper was bullying Mekas or that Mekas get bullied."

Sovietologist Robert van Voren voiced criticisms of Casper's articles. Saulius Sužiedėlis argued, "The review format of the articles allowed Casper to present judgements without the burden of buttressing his allegations with relevant sources and requisite detail. The resulting narrative turns Jonas Mekas's life as a young man into something that it was not."

The film scholars J. Hoberman and B. Ruby Rich have shown support for Casper's findings. An article in Film Quarterly, B. Ruby Rich stated that, upon Casper's article, "The wagons started circling immediately to protect a sacred figure of the avant-garde." In 2023, both Casper and Sužiedėlis shared their research and perspectives on Mekas in separate interviews with Lithuanian journalist Karolis Vyšniauskas.

Awards and honors

Guggenheim Fellowship (1977)
Creative Arts Award, Brandeis University (1977)
Mel Novikoff Award, San Francisco Film Festival (1992)
Lithuanian National Prize, Lithuania (1995)
Doctor of Fine Arts, Honoris Causa, Kansas City Art Institute (1996)
Special Tribute, New York Film Critics Circle Awards (1996)
Pier Paolo Pasolini Award, Paris (1997)
International Documentary Film Association Award, Los Angeles (1997)
Governors Award from the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Maine (1997)
Atrium Doctoris Honoris Causa, Vytautas Magnus University, Lithuania (1997)
Represented Lithuania at the 51st International Art Exhibition Venice Biennial (2005)
United States National Film Preservation Board selects Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania for preservation in the Library of Congress' National Film Registry (2006)
Los Angeles Film Critics Association's Award (2006)
Austrian Decoration for Science and Art (2008)
Baltic Cultural Achievement Award for Outstanding Contributions to the field of Arts and Science (2008)
Life Achievement Award at the second annual Rob Pruitt's Art Awards (2010)
George Eastman Honorary Scholar Award (2011)
'Carry your Light and Believe' Award, Ministry of Culture, Lithuania (2012)
Commandeur de l'Ordre des Arts et Lettres, Ministry of Culture, France (2013)

Filmography

Sources:

Guns of the Trees (1962) - 1 hour 15 minutes
Film Magazine of the Arts (1963) - 20 minutes
The Brig (1964) - 1 hour 8 minutes
Empire (1964) - 8 hours 5 minutes
Award Presentation to Andy Warhol (1964) - 12 minutes
Report from Millbrook (1964–65) - 12 minutes
Hare Krishna (1966) - 4 minutes
Notes on the Circus (1966) - 12 minutes
Cassis (1966) - 4 minutes
The Italian Notebook (1967) - 15 minutes
Time and Fortune Vietnam Newsreel (1968) - 4 minutes
Walden (Diaries, Notes, and Sketches) (1969) - 3 hours
Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1971–72) - 1 hour 22 minutes
Lost, Lost, Lost (1976) - 2 hours 58 minutes
In Between: 1964–8 (1978) - 52 minutes
Notes for Jerome (1978) - 45 minutes
Paradise Not Yet Lost (also known as Oona's Third Year) (1979) - 1 hour 36 minutes
Street Songs (1966/1983) - 10 minutes
Cups/Saucers/Dancers/Radio (1965/1983) - 23 minutes
Erik Hawkins: Excerpts from "Here and Now with Watchers"/Lucia Dlugoszewski Performs (1983) - 6 minutes
He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life (1969/1986) - 2 hours 30 minutes
A Walk (1990) - 58 minutes, video
Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol (1990) - 35 minutes
Mob of Angels/The Baptism (1991) - 1 hour, video
Dr. Carl G. Jung or Lapis Philosophorum (1991) - 29 minutes
Quartet Number One (1991) - 8 minutes
Mob of Angels at St. Ann (1992) - 1 hour, video
Zefiro Torna or Scenes from the Life of George Maciunas (1992) - 34 minutes
The Education of Sebastian or Egypt Regained (1992) - 3 hours 48 minutes
He Travels. In Search of... (1994) - 2 hours
Imperfect 3-Image Films (1995) - 6 minutes
On My Way to Fujiyama I Met... (1995) - 25 minutes
Happy Birthday to John (1996) - 24 minutes
Memories of Frankenstein (1996) - 1 hour 35 minutes
Birth of a Nation (1997) - 1 hour 25 minutes
Scenes from Allen's Last Three Days on Earth as a Spirit (1997) - 1 hour 7 minutes
Letter from Nowhere – Laiskas is Niekur N.1 (1997) - 1 hour 15 minutes
Silence, Please (2000) - 6 minutes, video
Requiem for a Manual Typewriter (2000) - 19 minutes, video
Remedy for Melancholy (2000) - 20 minutes
Symphony of Joy (1997) - 1 hour 15 minutes
Song of Avignon (1998) - 5 minutes
Laboratorium (1999) - 1 hour 3 minutes
Autobiography of a Man Who Carried His Memory in His Eyes (2000) - 53 minutes
This Side of Paradise (1999) - 35 minutes
Notes on Andy's Factory (1999) - 1 hour 4 minutes
Mysteries (1966–2001) - 34 minutes
As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty (2000) - 4 hours 48 minutes
Ein Maerchen (2001) - 6 minutes, video
Letter to Penny Arcade (2001) - 14 minutes 33 seconds, video
Williamsburg, Brooklyn (1950–2003) - 15 minutes
Ar Buvo Karas? (2002) - 2 hours 28 minutes
Travel Songs 1967-1981 (2003) - 28 minutes
Father and Daughter (2005) - 4 minutes 30 seconds, video
Scenes from the Life of Hermann Nitsch (2005) - 58 minutes, film and video
First Forty (2006) -
365 Day Project (2007) -
WTC Haikus (2010) - 14 minutes
Sleepless Nights Stories (Premiere at the Berlinale 2011) - 1 hour 54 minutes
My Paris Movie (2011) - 2 hours 39 minutes
My Mars Bar Movie (2011) - 1 hour 27 minutes
Correspondences: José Luis Guerin and Jonas Mekas (2011) - 1 hour 40 minutes
Re: George Maciunas and Fluxus (2011) - 1 hour 27 minutes
Mont Ventoux (2011) - 3 minutes
Happy Easter Ride (2012) - 18 minutes
Reminiszenzen aus Deutschland (2012) - 25 minutes
Out-takes from the Life of a Happy Man (2012) - 1 hour 8 minutes
Requiem (2019) - 1 hour 24 minutes

References

"Jim Jarmusch Interview: How Jonas Mekas Expanded the Possibilities of Film"
Needham, Alex (January 23, 2019). "Jonas Mekas, titan of underground filmmaking, dies aged 96". The Guardian. Retrieved April 2, 2019.
"Interview: Jonas Mekas by Modestas Mankus". Our Culture Mag. April 18, 2017.
^ "Lectures on Avant-Garde Art, Films Planned During Artist's Visit". Iowa City Press-Citizen. Iowa City, IA. November 1, 1995. p. 21. Retrieved May 13, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
""I'm Like the Last Leaf of A Big Tree": A Conversation with Jonas Mekas | Village Voice". September 21, 2017. Archived from the original on September 21, 2017. Retrieved September 18, 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
Casper, Michael. "I Was There | Michael Casper". The New York Review of Books 2022. ISSN 0028-7504. Retrieved July 20, 2022.
"World War II Revisionism at the Jewish Museum". Jewish Currents. Retrieved February 28, 2023.
Vyšniauskas, Karolis. "Correcting the Record: Michael Casper on Jonas Mekas | NARA". nara.lt. Retrieved February 28, 2023.
"Portrait of a Poet as a Young Man: Jonas Mekas in War and Exile - Journal #129". www.e-flux.com. Retrieved July 17, 2023.
Mekas' passport shows December 23, 1922, the date sometimes listed as his "official" date of birth; however, he was actually born on December 24, 1922, as he confirms in this video interview Archived April 4, 2009, at the Wayback Machine.
"Parodos - Maironio lietuvių literatūros muziejus". maironiomuziejus.lt.
"Mekas, Jonas | Encyclopedia.com". www.encyclopedia.com. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
Stasiulis, Stanislovas (February 2020). "The Holocaust in Lithuania: The Key Characteristics of Its History, and the Key Issues in Historiography and Cultural Memory". East European Politics and Societies and Cultures. 34 (1): 261–279. doi:10.1177/0888325419844820. S2CID 204480888.
Tapinas, Laimonas (1997). Žurnalistikos Enciklopedija (in Lithuanian). Vilnius: Pradai. p. 355.
"Jonas Mekas". www.vle.lt (in Lithuanian). Retrieved May 3, 2022.
Saulius, Sužiedėlis (2012). "Memories of Blood: Some Aspects of Lithuanian Responses to the Holocaust" (PDF). Jahrbuch für Antisemitismusforschung. 21: 214–236.
Tapinas, Laimonas (1997). Žurnalistikos Enciklopedija (in Lithuanian). Vilnius: Pradas. p. 373.
"Jonas Mekas". www.vle.lt (in Lithuanian). Retrieved May 3, 2022.
Mekas, Jonas (2017). I had nowhere to go. Leipzig. ISBN 978-3-95905-146-0. OCLC 982432242.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
Brody, Richard (April 21, 2016). "Jonas Mekas, Champion of the "Poetic" Cinema". The New Yorker. Retrieved May 21, 2022.
"Jonas Mekas, I find a kindred spirit in Marie Menken, Web of Stories". Retrieved January 7, 2022.
"Jonas Mekas, Serpentine Gallery, London". The Independent. Archived from the original on June 14, 2022. Retrieved November 16, 2018.
"The private world of '60s legends". CNN Style. November 14, 2017. Retrieved November 16, 2018.
Taubin, Amy (March–April 2019). "A Pageant of Glimpses". Film Comment. 55 (2): 65. JSTOR 26747356.
Jonathan Cott (July 16, 2013). Days That I'll Remember: Spending Time With John Lennon & Yoko Ono. Omnibus Press. p. 74. ISBN 978-1-78323-048-8.
Short Films Coming Soon to an iPod Near You, All Things Considered, November 5, 2006. Producer Ben Shapiro reports on a plan by filmmaker Jonas Mekas to make short films available as a podcast.
Bloch, Mark (September 4, 2018). "Jonas Mekas: Notes from Downtown". The Brooklyn Rail.
Requiem - The Shed
"Oral history interview with Jonas Mekas - Collections Search - United States Holocaust Memorial Museum". collections.ushmm.org. Retrieved April 27, 2022.
Heinrich, Will (March 17, 2022). "The Avant-Garde Filmmaker Who Tried to Tell the Truth". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"Jonas Mekas Film and Videography". September 14, 2016. Retrieved February 12, 2017.
"Jonas Mekas, avant-garde filmmaker and iconic New Yorker, dies at 96". BrooklynVegan. January 23, 2019.
Weber, Bruce (January 23, 2019). "Jonas Mekas, 'Godfather' of American Avant-Garde Film, Is Dead at 96". The New York Times. Retrieved December 23, 2021.
"Fragments of Paradise - Our Films - Kunhardt Films". www.kunhardtfilms.com. Retrieved September 10, 2022.
Roxborough, Scott (September 10, 2022). "Sackler Documentary 'All the Beauty and the Bloodshed' Wins Venice 2022 Golden Lion for Best Film". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved September 11, 2022.
Casper, Michael. "I Was There | Michael Casper". The New York Review of Books 2022. ISSN 0028-7504. Retrieved April 26, 2022.
Casper, Michael; Schwabsky, Barry. "On Jonas Mekas: An Exchange | Barry Schwabsky". The New York Review of Books 2022. ISSN 0028-7504. Retrieved April 26, 2022.
"Oral history interview with Jonas Mekas - Collections Search - United States Holocaust Memorial Museum". collections.ushmm.org. Retrieved April 27, 2022.
"World War II Revisionism at the Jewish Museum". Jewish Currents. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
"Historian accuses NY's Jewish Museum of sanitizing filmmaker's World War II record in new exhibit". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. May 12, 2022. Retrieved May 13, 2022.
Shalev, Asaf (May 12, 2022). "Personal account".
"Portrait of a Poet as a Young Man: Jonas Mekas in War and Exile - Journal #129 September 2022 - e-flux". www.e-flux.com. Retrieved September 10, 2022.
Vyšniauskas, Karolis. "Ne tik pripažinti, bet prisipažinti. Apie Holokausto atmintį su Sauliumi Sužiedėliu | NARA". nara.lt (in Lithuanian). Retrieved July 17, 2022.
"Forgotten evil? Jonas Mekas and the trauma of the Holocaust – opinion". lrt.lt. May 2, 2021. Retrieved April 28, 2022.
"J. Hoberman – Why I cannot review Jonas Mekas's Conversations with Film-Makers". June 30, 2018. Retrieved July 20, 2022.
"A Deer in the Headlights". Film Quarterly. September 14, 2018. Retrieved July 20, 2022.
"A Deer in the Headlights". Film Quarterly. September 14, 2018. Retrieved September 18, 2022.
Vyšniauskas, Karolis. "Correcting the Record: Michael Casper on Jonas Mekas | NARA". nara.lt. Retrieved January 26, 2023.
Vyšniauskas, Karolis. "Ne tik pripažinti, bet prisipažinti. Apie Holokausto atmintį su Sauliumi Sužiedėliu | NARA". nara.lt (in Lithuanian). Retrieved October 31, 2023.
"John Simon Guggenheim Foundation | Jonas Mekas".
"San Francisco International Film Festival (1992)". IMDb. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"Jonas Mekas: LIFE GOES ON…I KEEP SINGING – Art in America Guide". Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"1997 Preservation & Scholarship Award: Jonas Mekas". International Documentary Association. November 1, 1997. Archived from the original on December 19, 2022. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"REMINISCENCES OF A JOURNEY TO LITHUANIA | Cinematheque". www.cia.edu. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"Jonas Mekas | Movie and Film Awards". AllMovie. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"Reply to a parliamentary question" (PDF) (in German). p. 1879. Retrieved November 27, 2012.
"Guggenheim Museum Announces Winners For Rob Pruitt's 2010 Art Awards". The Guggenheim Museums and Foundation. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
Low, Stuart. "Prizes announced for cinema, photography". Democrat and Chronicle. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"Jonas Mekas Receives The Order Of Arts And Letters". frenchculture.org. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"Jonas Mekas". IMDb. Retrieved December 19, 2022.
"Jonas Mekas Filmography". Jonas Mekas Official Website. Retrieved November 17, 2023.

External links

Jonas Mekas' website
The Anthology Film Archives
Jonas Mekas Visual Arts Center
A Conversation between Jonas Mekas and Stan Brakhage Archived November 3, 2010, at the Wayback Machine
Interview with Interview Magazine
Interview with 3:AM Magazine
Jonas Mekas "The Internet Saga", Venice
Senses of Cinema: Great Directors Critical Database
Jonas Mekas interview with Our Culture Mag
Jonas Mekas in conversation with the Brooklyn Rail
Jonas Mekas poetry in English
Jonas Mekas tells his life story at Web of Stories
"To Barbara Rubin With Love" by Jonas Mekas
Jonas Mekas addresses his war time activities.
Jonas Mekas at the Serpentine Gallery 2012

v t e Jonas Mekas
Films directed	Guns of the Trees (1962) Walden (1968) Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1972) As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty (2000)
Institutions	Anthology Film Archives Film Culture The Film-Makers' Cooperative Jonas Mekas Visual Arts Center
Works about	Jonas in the Jungle

v t e Recipients of the Lithuanian National Prize
1989–1993	1989 J. Juškaitis A. Martinaitis Š. Sauka K. Matuzevičius H. Šablevičius Čiurlionis Quartet J. Tankevičius D. Dikšaitis G. Dačinskas S. Lipčius 1990 J. Juzeliūnas K.N. Kitkauskas A. Steponavičius Z. Žemaitytė R. Požerskis 1991 V. Bložė J. Kačinskas G. Karalius B. Radzevičius P.R. Vaitekūnas 1992 V. Antanavičius K. Bradūnas V. Drėma P. Geniušas A. Šliogeris 1993 P. Bingelis V. Daujotytė V. Kavolis V. Kašuba L. Noreika
1994–1998	1994 S. Geda G. Rinkevičius A. Dovydėnas R. Midvikis A. Žebrauskas R. Krištapavičius A. Sakalauskas R. Tuminas 1995 A. Macijauskas R. Katilius B. Kutavičius A. Petrulis V. Šerys J. Mekas A. Rubšys 1996 O. Balakauskas S. Kuzma V. Masalskis V. Prudnikovas J. Strielkūnas E. Špokaitė V. Valius 1997 A. Nyka-Niliūnas O. Narbutaitė P. Repšys J. Erlickas A. Šenderovas R. Ibelgauptienė Z. Ibelgauptas E. Nekrošius 1998 V. Bartulis F. Jakubauskas A. Kunčius M. Martinaitis D. Sauka A. Šaltenienė A. Bumblauskas A. Galinis E. Gudavičius A. Žostautas
1999–2003	1999 J. Onaitytė D. Kajokas K. Pempė G. Ramunis A. Savickas L.L. Katinas M. Navakas A. Zalatorius S. Sondeckis O. Narbutienė 2000 E. Cukermanas D. Kasčiūnaitė R. Granauskas T. Venclova N. Miliauskaitė I. Milkevičiūtė J. Domarkas V. Bagdonas A. Jacovskis 2001 L. Gutauskas Š. Bartas J. Marcinkevičius F. Bajoras V. Urmanavičiūtė L.V. Strioga S. Eidrigevičius D. Katkus K. Smoriginas 2002 R. Antinis P. Vyšniauskas O. Koršunovas J. Juozapaitis A. Každailis A. Stonys J. Mikelinskas K. Platelis D. Geringas 2003 A.J. Kuras J. Aleksa V. Juozapaitis V. Barkauskas A.A. Jonynas P. Dirgėla B. Vilimaitė A. Sutkus J. Vaitkus
2004–2008	2004 O. Baliukonytė S. Parulskis J. Paulėkaitė P. Mazūras M. Vilutis R. Mažulis S. Stonytė S. Žvirgždas Vilnius State Quartet A. Vainiūnaitė A. Šilalė G. Jakaitis A. Vasiliauskas 2005 G. Varnas L. Oržekauskienė J. Aputis J. Ivanauskaitė K. Jaroševaitė V. Laurušas A. Marčėnas A. Matelis R. Šervenikas 2006 S. Juškys K. Navakas N. Lukšionytė-Tolvaišienė V. Balčytis J.V. Bruveris R. Kepežinskas M. Rubackytė R. Sakalauskas A. Vizgirda 2007 V. Kernagis A. Andriuškevičius Š. Nakas V. Paukštė N. Urbonienė G. Urbonas Z. Nagytė-Katiliškienė 2008 R. Staliliūnaitė-Matulionienė V. Povilionienė A. Gailius R. Šerkšnytė D. Narkevičius V. Juknaitė
2009–2013	2009 A. Grikevičius J.R. Jurašas R. Kazlas M. Matušakaitė R. Rakauskas R. Skučaitė 2010 V. Noreika I. Meras V. Augustinas R. Rastauskas P. Mataitis D. Mataitienė J. Gasiūnas 2011 A. Žebriūnas A. Aleksandravičius V. Landsbergis K. Grigaliūnas H. Čigriejus A. Krikščiūnaitė 2012 V. Vildžiūnas K. Nastopka V. Mazūras E. Miliūnas Ž. Kempinas M. Pitrėnas 2013 D. Banionis F. Latėnas G. Kuprevičius V. Braziūnas J. Budraitis J. Gricius
2014–2018	2014 R. Adomaitis J. G. Kanovičius R. Palekas N. Savičenko E. V. Sventickas A. Šeškus 2015 A. J. Ambrazas L. M. Digrys D. Gavenonis G. Subačienė V. Urbanavičius Birutė Žilytė-Steponavičienė

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