Lithuania celebrates Jonas Mekas on his centenary

Lithuania has initiated a year-long celebration to pay tribute to Jonas Mekas (Biržai, 1922 – New York, 2019), a prominent filmmaker and co-founder of Film Culture and Anthology Film Archives. This program encompasses around fifteen nations, including Italy, where retrospectives organized by Francesco Urbano Ragazzi will take place in both Rome and Bologna. The main activities will occur in Vilnius and Biržai, with significant collaboration from the Meno avilys Foundation, whose co-founder Lukas Brašiškis remarked, "There was no film culture in Lithuania before him." The foundation also supports a Ukrainian cinema student and hosts various screenings and events. Rimas Uzgiris reads Mekas's Beat Generation-influenced poetry at a monument in Semeniškiai, while Vytautas Landsbergis described Mekas's work as "a single vital flow."