RIP Jonas Mekas, Happy Avant Garde Poet/Filmmaker Moved on at 96
Dear Friends,
Jonas passed away quietly and peacefully early this morning. He was at home with family. He will be greatly missed but his light shines on. — with Maria Sweet-Herz. (via FB Jonas Mekas)
Jonas Mekas, hailed by many as “the godfather of American avant-garde cinema” has passed away at the age of 96. (via FB Experimental Conversation)
Left, Jonas Mekas and brother Adolfas at the Film-Makers’ Cooperative, 1962. © Jonas Mekas. Right, Jonas Mekas with his Bolex in Lithuania, 1971. © Jonas Mekas
Photo via Life of a happy man
Arthur 
with Jonas Mekas
Jonas Mekas 
Jonas Mekas, Jim Jarmusch on film, poetry and Trump
JJ: I was just looking through a small amount of different artists – film artists – that you have preserved or celebrated. This is only a small amount of people that have really moved me: Peter Hutton, Hollis Frampton, Nam June Paik, Bruce Conner, Hans Richter, Taylor Mead, Danny Lyon, Rudy Burckhardt, Shirley Clarke…
JM: And we have not only their finished films, but unfinished materials. Outtakes of Hans Richter, Maya Deren, Hollis Frampton and even Tarkovsky.
JJ: … Man Ray, Joseph Cornell, Robert Frank, Harry Smith, Jack Smith, George and Mike Kuchar, Kenneth Anger, Lizzie Borden, Stan Brakhage, Bruce Baillie, Ron Rice, Michael Snow, Andy Warhol, Ken Jacobs, Maya Deren… on and on.
JM: Anthology is the bastion of poetry and cinema and we are here to stay. This is the building where the poets of cinema live. It is a metaphor, this building.