from Cinemascope:
In the Mekas universe, “small” is synonymous with everyday life: there is nothing that brings the man more joy than spending time with friends and family, travelling, being in nature and partaking of the fine arts, especially music, “personal” filmmaking and poetry. By contrast, “big” is institutionalized power: imperialism and war-mongering, bureaucracies and ivory towers, “impersonal” filmmaking and much of modernity and its soulless mass culture. Perhaps more than any other filmmaker, Mekas has positioned the
individual creative will of the artist—his own persona: romantic, fanciful, curious, shy, European, haunted—as the most powerful force against authority of all stripes.
And that is not just how artists should be, but human beings as well. Nietzsche: the metaphysical function of man is to create art.
[tags]Jonas Mekas, documentary, Lithuania, art, artists, filmmakers, film, video, culture[/tags]
