Idleness as an Illusion: Jonas Mekas
The first time I saw Jonas Mekas was on a poster placed next to the entry of the Austrian Film Museum in April 2013. He was lying in the grass, stretched legs, eyes closed, arms behind his head. The image looked very much like one of my favorite paintings, the Shepherd Boy by Franz von Lenbach. Something was unusual about this poster though. It was split in two, with the upper part of Mekas’ body displayed at the bottom and his red leather shoes on top. I didn’t know back then how the simultaneous presence of the man and his literal point-of-view perfectly described the filmmaker’s approach. After all, he mostly made personal films about what he encountered in his daily life. Shots from windows, on the streets, in nature, in the houses of friends; the material we are now used to see on Instagram (just much more beautiful) constructed into an almost hypnotic flow of impressions. He made films in order to prove to himself that he actually exists. Inside the cinema Mekas introduced his work by putting away with such descriptions. Slow movements, sparkling eyes, he walked with a stoop and a tired smile which makes people above ninety sometimes appear mischievous or at least cheeky. He declared: “There is nothing to describe. There is nothing to read in cinema. You cannot read a film.“ Everybody stared at him in dull agreement. He was a legend.
Patrick Holzapfel works as a writer, film critic and programmer. His debut novel "Ermine on Benches" appeared in 2024. He is editor-in-chief of "Jugend ohne Film", a website and magazine exploring the thresholds between film writing and literature. Photo credits: Anna Painer
