An innovative retrospective of work by Jonas Mekas reveals the fundamental honesty of his “diary” films.
A Lithuanian refugee who landed in New York City in 1949 at the age of 27, Jonas Mekas became a founder of the Film-Makers’ Cooperative, Film Culture magazine and Anthology Film Archives. He was the first full-time critic at The Village Voice, writing about film, and a widely published poet. But he also made scores of collagelike “diary” films that documented his busy, art-filled life.