I’m not an abstract artist; I leave that to others. To me, abstract art ended with Kazimir Malevich’s ‘Black Square.’ To continue it is senseless. Jonas Mekas Read Quote
I brought Yoko Ono to New York and gave her her first job there. I was editing a magazine called ‘Film Culture.’ Jonas Mekas Read Quote
In narrative cinema, a certain terminology has already been established: ‘film noir,’ ‘Western,’ even ‘Spaghetti Western.’ When we say ‘film noir’ we know what we are talking about. But in non-narrative cinema, we are a little bit lost. So sometimes, the only way to make us understand what we are talking about is to use the term ‘avant-garde.’ Jonas Mekas Read Quote
I always work only with friends, but it must be about them and myself. Because I film only very personal moments, nothing preplanned, staged or written, it has to be real and spontaneous. Some of them have become famous, some are not yet famous, some will never be famous. But they are all my friends. Jonas Mekas Read Quote
Yes, I got my first Bolex camera a few weeks after being dropped in New York by the United Nations Refugee Organization. That was on October 29th, 1949. With my brother Adolfas, we wanted to make a film about displaced persons, how one feels being uprooted from one’s home. Jonas Mekas Read Quote
I live, therefore I make films. I make film, therefore I live. Life. Movement. I make home movies, therefore I live. I live, therefore I make home movies. Jonas Mekas Read Quote
I’m working in a form of cinema that can be described, and has been described, as a diaristic form of cinema. In other words, with material from my own life. I walk through life with my camera, and occasionally I film. I never think about scripts, never think about films, making films. Jonas Mekas Read Quote
My life is essentially not so unique. On some deeper levels we feel the same, we know the same things. Therefore if I show my life 365 days, moments from those days, it will reflect and it will have connection with lives of all of us. Jonas Mekas Read Quote
To me, cinema is cinema. Cinema is one big tree with many branches. The same as literature. In literature, you don’t just say, ‘Oh, I bought some literature.’ No, you say, ‘I bought a novel’ by so-and-so, or a book of essays by so-and-so. Jonas Mekas Read Quote
Once you change the technology – from a film camera to a video camera, or from an 8-mm camera to 16 mm – you change completely the content. With 8 mm, a leaf on a tree will be made up of maybe four grains. So it’s very impressionistic, almost like Seurat. If you switch to 16 mm, the technology gives you hundreds of grains on that leaf. Jonas Mekas Read Quote
