1962 to 1964 was a pivotal moment in the evolution of American arts and culture, especially in New York City. These years, crucial to the development of Pop, Minimalism, and performance, saw the emergence of a new generation of radical artists, as well as venues that gave their iconoclastic work a home and a context. Movies, meanwhile, were undergoing a transformation of their own: the rise of a truly independent cinema, of works unencumbered by the medium’s aesthetic conventions and commercial imperatives.

“Cinema,” wrote Jonas Mekas in a 1962 Village Voice column, “is beginning to move. Cinema is becoming conscious of its steps. Cinema is no longer embarrassed by its own stammerings, hesitations, side steps. Until now cinema could move only in a robotlike step, on preplanned tracks, indicated lines. Now it is beginning to move freely, by itself, according to its own wishes and whims, tracing its own steps. Cinema is doing away with theatrics, cinema is searching for its own truth, cinema is mumbling, like Marlon Brando, like James Dean. That’s what this is all about: new times, new content, new language.”

FLC’s highly focused series, which coincides with the Jewish Museum’s upcoming exhibition New York: 1962–1964 (on view from July 22, 2022 to January 8, 2023), will feature key efforts by Kenneth Anger, Shirley Clarke, the Kuchar Brothers, Marie Menken, Jonas Mekas, Carolee Schneemann, Jack Smith, and Andy Warhol, to name a handful. Join us as we look back on this richly varied—and still underappreciated—period of experimental cinema.

*HALLELUJAH THE HILLS* (Adolfas Mekas, 1963)

GME distributes several of these films, and others by filmmakers appearing in New York, 1962–1964: Underground and Experimental Cinema including those linked above as well as by Rudy Burckhardt, Owen Land, Francis Lee, Aldofas Mekas, Jackie Raynal, and Michael Snow.

Filmmaking Brothers George and Mike Kuchar

New York, 1962–1964: Underground and Experimental Cinema at Film at Lincoln Center will run from July 29 through August 4, and Film Forum’s 1962…1963…1964 series will run from July 22 through August 11. The Jewish Museum’s exhibition, New York, 1962–1964, will open on July 22 and remain on view through January 8, 2023. Tickets are available on the respective venues’ websites.

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Films and Filmmakers Distributed by GME Showing in New York, 1962–1964: Underground and Experimental Cinema Series and Exhibition by Film at Lincoln Center, Film Forum and the Jewish Museum