“Her lens is focused on the physical world, but she sees it through a poetic temperament. She catches the bits and fragments of the world around her and organizes them into aesthetic unities which communicate to us…Does Menken transpose reality or condense it? Or does she simply go direct to the essence ot it?” (Jonas Mekas) Tonight we present rare films by Marie Menken, one of the major independent American filmmakers of the 1940’s-60’s. Menken’s delicate, highly personal ouvre–she was the first to film simple daily events, taking “home movies” as art–influenced Anger, Warhol, Brakhage, Hammer, and many others. Films will include Eye Music In Red Major, Arabesque for Kenneth Anger, Andy Warhol, Notebook, Glimpse of the Garden and several others.
Thursday, March 13, 1997
Secret Thoughts
The Films Of Marie Menken
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts