Marie Menken
- Marie Menken
Born in New York City in 1910, died in Brooklyn in 1970. As filmmaker, actress, painter and active member of the New York society her work became important for the independent film scene and the experimental film movement. Her work influenced, among others, Kenneth Anger, Stan Brakhage and Jonas Mekas. She was a member of 'Gryphon-Group' and the 'New American Cinema' and worked, among others, with Andy Warhol.
“Between 1945 and 1968, Marie Menken made 18 short films. She was a painter when she started making films in 1945. In an interview with P. Adams Sitney from 1967 she said: 'Because filmmaking was an extension of my painting, I tried it and loved it. In filmmaking every image is an image and what fun that is! And it's moving, while a painting is there, immobile, for all time.' In her often playful filmic poems, which are all very different from each other, Marie Menken 'speaks' with her camera. That is what makes her films so vital, so present and personal and what gives them such an important place within the New American Cinema. Jonas Mekas said: 'Marie was one of the first to improvise with the camera, to edit in-camera, while she was shooting. She filmed with all her nervous system and when you watch her films, the details of her images are one thing. Another thing, maybe more important for the essence, for what she is trying to tell us, is the movement, the movement and the rhythm. You can feel it, you can feel Marie behind every image, how she built the film in little pieces and through movement. The movement and the rhythm, that's what so many of us picked up and developed further in their own work – that's what I think had a great influence on Stan Brakhage and on me, of course. And she provided us with a new beginning – she turned film, non-narrative film, poetic film, the language of film into a whole new direction – away from the classical, into the new adventure – Thank you Marie Menken!'“ (Ute Aurand)
in distribution
Excursion, 1968
Andy Warhol, 1965
Wrestlers, 1964
Moon Play, 1961
Lights, 1964/65
Watts with Eggs, 1964
Go!Go!Go!, 1963
Notebook, 1962
Mood Mondrian, 1961/62
Sidewalks, 1961/62
Drips in Strips, 1961
Bagatelle for Willard Maas, 1961
Eye Music in Red Major, 1961
Dwigthiana, 1959
Hurry!Hurry!, 1957
Glimpse of the Garden, 1957
