Jonas Mekas Visual Arts Center
Gintaras Sodeika
This year we celebrate the 100th anniversary of Jonas Mekas’ birth. JOnas Mekas is one of the greatest film camera virtuosos of the 20th and 21th centuries. The artist also doesn’t shy away from using a video camera. Although true that the latter is less “aesthetically privileged”, video is very well suited for diaristic recordings, “letter” writing, conversations with others as well as with oneself.
During 2007, a video camera “wrote” Jonas’ diary with entries about everyday events. Each day’s video diary entry became a month’s worth and finally, a subjective video chronicle of an entire year in which each day is represented with a film lasting only a few minutes with an accompanying written dedication, poem, insight…
The recorded images in the “right here and now” video diary are intertwined with archival film photo clips, reminiscences, dreams, poetry. They, in turn, are interspersed with the words, thoughts and worlds of others as well, so that the diary becomes not only the documentation of the everyday, but also a meditative journey through the dimensions of spirit and memory.
Jonas Mekas, 365 dienos
Video
154x33x33 cm
2007