Robert Beavers

Directing·Jan 1, 1949·Brookline, Massachusetts, USA

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Robert Beavers (born 1949) is an American experimental filmmaker whose work stands among the most significant in postwar avant-garde cinema. He is best known for My Hand Outstretched to the Winged Distance and Sightless Measure, an 18-film cycle spanning decades of work, much of it later re-edited. Beavers developed a distinctive visual language using hand-cut mattes, filters, and precise sound–image structures, often focusing on craft and manual labor as metaphors for filmmaking itself. Born in Brookline, Massachusetts, he began making films in New York before moving to Europe in 1967 with his partner, Gregory J. Markopoulos. Together they withdrew their films from distribution, presenting them only at the Temenos screenings in Arcadia, Greece (1980–86). After Markopoulos’s death in 1992, Beavers founded Temenos, Inc. to preserve both of their legacies. His films draw deeply on place and history, from Florence in From the Notebook of… (1971/1998) and Venice in Ruskin (1975/1997) to the Greek landscapes of Wingseed (1985), The Hedge Theater (1986–90/2002), and The Ground (1993–2001). Later works include Pitcher of Colored Light (2007), The Suppliant (2012), Listening to the Space in My Room (2013), and The Sparrow Dream (2022). Beavers continues to live and work between Berlin and Massachusetts with filmmaker Ute Aurand, while overseeing the preservation of both his own films and Markopoulos’s Eniaios.

Film	Credit
Dedication: Bernice Hodges2024 · Director	Director
The Sparrow Dream2022 · Director	Director
“Der Klang, die Welt…”2018 · Director	Director
Among the Eucalyptuses2017 · Director	Director
Shared Table2016 · Director	Director
FFirst Weeks2014 · Director	Director
Listening to the Space in My Room2013 · Director	Director
The Suppliant2010 · Director	Director
Pitcher of Colored Light2007 · Director	Director
My Hand Outstretched to the Winged Distance and Sightless Measure2005 · Director	Director
Early Monthly Segments2003 · Actor, Director	Actor, Director
The Hedge Theater2002 · Director	Director
The Ground2001 · Director	Director
Sotiros2000 · Actor, Director	Actor, Director
The Stoas1997 · Director	Director
Wingseed1985 · Director	Director
Efpsychi1983 · Director	Director
Amor1980 · Director	Director
SSotiros in the Elements1978 · Director	Director
SSotiros (Alone)1978 · Director	Director
SSotiros Responds1977 · Director	Director
Ruskin1974 · Director	Director
Work Done1973 · Director	Director
From the Notebook of...1972 · Director	Director
The Painting1972 · Director	Director
Still Light1971 · Actor, Director	Actor, Director
Diminished Frame1970 · Director	Director
Palinode1970 · Director	Director
The Count of Days1969 · Director	Director
VView1969 · Director	Director
Plan of Brussels1968 · Actor, Director	Actor, Director
Winged Dialogue1967 · Actor, Director	Actor, Director
OOn the Everyday Use of the Eyes of Death1967 · Director	Director
Spiracle1967 · Director	Director
My Hand Outstretched to the Winged Distance and Sightless MeasureDirector	Director