Ken Jacobs

Directing·May 25, 1933·Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York, USA

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A pioneer of the American film avant-garde of the 1960s and '70s, Ken Jacobs is a central figure in post-war experimental cinema. From his first films of the late 1950s to his recent experiments with digital video, his investigations and innovations have influenced countless artists. A New Yorker by birth, Jacobs graduated from City University to find himself in the midst of the downtown art scene of the 1960s, which included artists Robert Rauschenberg and Andy Warhol, beat writers Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac; and the experimental theater troupes of Trisha Brown and Yvonne Rainer. Although Jacobs had studied painting with Hans Hoffman, he quickly gravitated to film, finding kindred spirits in radical filmmakers such as Jonas Mekas and Hollis Frampton. An early friendship with Jack Smith yielded several collaborations, including the seminal underground films Blonde Cobra (which Jonas Mekas dubbed "the masterpiece of Baudelairean cinema") and Little Stabs at Happiness, as well as a Provincetown beach-based live show, The Human Wreckage Review.

Film	Credit
Downtown Loft with Skylights2026 · Director	Director
AA Date with Shirley2026 · Director	Director
BOOK OF ETERNALISMS 432026 · Director	Director
BOOK OF ETERNALISMS 412026 · Director	Director
BOOK OF ETERNALISMS 422026 · Director	Director
BOOK OF ETERNALISMS 402025 · Director	Director
Book of Eternalisms 392025 · Director	Director
Art Spiegelman: Disaster Is My Muse2025 · Self	Self
BBMT2025 · Director	Director
RRiverbed2024 · Director	Director
TTourists of the Familiar 702024 · Director	Director
Ken Jacobs - from Orchard Street to the Museum of Modern Art2023 · Self	Self
Book of Eternalisms 82023 · Director	Director
Book of Eternalisms 72023 · Director	Director
FFor James Otis2023 · Director	Director
Art-House America: Austin Film Society2023 · Self	Self
Up the Illusion2023 · Actor, Director	Actor, Director
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde2023 · Director	Director
Writhing City2023 · Director	Director
Other Urban Lives2023 · Director	Director
From Introduction to Orson Welles’s Falstaff: Chimes at Midnight2023 · Director	Director
Book of Eternalisms 1-62023 · Director	Director
Spasm2023 · Director	Director
Whims of Twenty Twenty-Three2023 · Director	Director
Tourists of the Familiar 12023 · Director	Director
Tourists of the Familiar 52023 · Director	Director
Tourists of the Familiar 102023 · Director	Director
Tourists of the Familiar 152023 · Director	Director
Tourists of the Familiar 202023 · Director	Director
MManhattan is an Island2023 · Director	Director
HHobgoblin Ball2023 · Director	Director
Real Action Figures2022 · Director	Director
When Timofeev Moves Everything Moves2022 · Director	Director
PPlease Leave a Message: Anthology Film Archives Voicemails Through the Ages2022 · Actor	Actor
Fragments of Paradise2022 · Self	Self
Sergei Eisenstein Embossed2022 · Director	Director
Buster Keaton Embossed2022 · Director	Director
One Dozen Roses2022 · Director	Director
America Lets Her Hair Down 19052022 · Director	Director
EEat the Rich: Aligning Perspectives and Other Challenges to Viewers2022 · Director	Director
Eternal Beach2021 · Director	Director
Abstract Eternalism2021 · Director	Director
Double Wow2021 · Director	Director
XCXHXEXRXRXIXEXSX2021 · Director	Director
Cartoonish 1-102021 · Director	Director
A Small Misunderstanding2021 · Director	Director
Adventures of Cookie Truck2021 · Director	Director
Hoffman Student2021 · Director	Director