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.
Full Filmography
Directing
Orchard Street
(1955)
Director
Saturday Afternoon Blood Sacrifice
(1956)
Director
Little Cobra Dance
(1956)
Director
Baud'larian Capers
(1962)
Director
Blonde Cobra
(1963)
Director
Little Stabs at Happiness
(1963)
Director
The Death of P'town
(1963)
Director
TV Plug
(1963)
Director
Artie and Marty Rosenblatt’s Baby Pictures
(1963)
Director
Window
(1964)
Director
The Winter Footage
(1964)
Director
We Stole Away
(1964)
Director
Winter Sky
(1964)
Director
1st Window
(1964)
Director
Lisa and Joey in Connecticut
(1965)
Director
Naomi Is A Dream of Loveliness
(1965)
Director
Airshaft
(1967)
Director
For Life, Against the War
(1967)
Director
Soft Rain
(1968)
Director
The Sky Socialist
(1968)
Director
Tom, Tom, the Piper's Son
(1969)
Director
Nissan Ariana Window
(1969)
Director
Globe
(1969)
Director
Binghamton, My India
(1970)
Director
Changing Azazel
(1973)
Director
Urban Peasants
(1975)
Director
Jerry Takes A Back Seat, Then Passes Out Of The Picture
(1975)
Director
Spaghetti Aza
(1976)
Director
The Doctor's Dream
(1977)
Director
Perfect Film
(1985)
Director
The Alps and The Jews
(1986)
Director
Chronometer
(1990)
Director
Opening the Nineteenth Century: 1896
(1991)
Director
Keaton's Cops
(1991)
Director
Bitemporal Vision: The Sea
(1994)
Director
Looting For Rodney
(1995)
Director
Make Light On Film
(1995)
Director
The Georgetown Loop
(1996)
Director
Disorient Express
(1996)
Director
Flo Rounds a Corner
(1999)
Director
New York Street-Trollys 1900
(1999)
Director
A Tom Tom Chaser
(2002)
Director
Circling Zero: Part One, We See Absence
(2002)
Director
Keeping an Eye on Stan
(2003)
Director
Star Spangled to Death
(2004)
Director
Mountaineer Spinning
(2004)
Director
Celestial Subway Lines/Salvaging Noise
(2005)
Director
Let There Be Whistle Blowers
(2005)
Director
Krypton Is Doomed
(2005)
Director
Spiral Nebula
(2005)
Director
Ontic Antics Starring Laurel and Hardy: Bye Molly
(2005)
Director
Insistent Clamor
(2005)
Director
Le Prince: Leeds Bridge 1888
(2005)
Director
Incendiary Cinema
(2005)
Director
The Surging Sea of Humanity
(2006)
Director
Two Wrenching Departures
(2006)
Director
Pushcarts of Eternity Street
(2006)
Director
Razzle Dazzle: The Lost World
(2007)
Director
New York Ghetto Fishmarket 1903
(2007)
Director
Capitalism: Child Labor
(2007)
Director
Capitalism: Slavery
(2007)
Director
Gift of Fire: Nineteen (Obscure) Frames That Changed The World
(2007)
Director
Hanky Panky January 1902
(2007)
Director
Nymph
(2007)
Director
We Are Charming
(2007)
Director
The Whirled
(2007)
Director
Popeye Sees 3-D, TOO
(2007)
Director
Mosco Street Rapture
(2007)
Director
Titles
(2007)
Director
Nervous Lantern at Kill Your Timid Notion Festival
(2007)
Director
Return to the Scene of the Crime
(2008)
Director
Anaglyph Tom (Tom with Puffy Cheeks)
(2008)
Director
The Scenic Route
(2008)
Director
Elbow Dance
(2008)
Director
Amorous Interludes: His Favorite Wife Improved (or The Virtue Of Bad Reception)
(2008)
Director
Alone at Last
(2008)
Director
The Discovery
(2008)
Director
Love Story
(2008)
Director
The Day Was a Scorcher
(2009)
Director
“Slow is Beauty”—Rodin
(2009)
Director
Berkeley To San Francisco
(2009)
Director
What Happened on 23rd Street in 1901
(2009)
Director
Jonas Mekas in Kodachrome Days
(2009)
Director
Bob Fleischner Dying
(2009)
Director
Brain Operations
(2009)
Director
Brook
(2009)
Director
Excerpt From THE SKY SOCIALIST Stratified
(2009)
Director
Hot Dogs At The Met
(2009)
Director
Ronald Gonzales, Sculptor
(2009)
Director
Gravity Is Tops
(2009)
Director
Walkway
(2009)
Director
The Signing
(2009)
Director
A Loft
(2010)
Director
Sensoriums at Sea: Dr. Toothy's New Entranceway
(2010)
Director
Sensoriums at Sea: Toothy Two
(2010)
Director
The Near-Collision
(2010)
Director
Fair And White: Parts I, II, III and Extra
(2010)
Director
Seeking the Monkey King
(2011)
Director
DAY AND NIGHT
(2011)
Director
America at War, The Home Front: Film Opening
(2011)
Director
The Pushcarts Leave Eternity Street
(2011)
Director
Another Occupation
(2011)
Director
The Green Wave
(2011)
Director
Cyclopean 3D: Life with a Beautiful Woman
(2011)
Director
The Roses
(2011)
Director
Revolving Door
(2011)
Director
60 Seconds of Solitude in Year Zero
(2011)
Director
Turbulent Waters
(2011)
Director
Blankets for Indians
(2012)
Director
Street Vendor
(2012)
Director
20 Little Films
(2012)
Director
A Primer in Sky Socialism
(2013)
Director
Joys of Waiting for the Broadway Bus #2
(2013)
Director
Joys of Waiting for the Broadway Bus #1
(2013)
Director
Joys of Waiting for the Broadway Bus #3
(2013)
Director
Joys of Waiting for the Broadway Bus #4
(2013)
Director
Canopy
(2014)
Director
The Guests
(2014)
Director
Wire Fence
(2014)
Director
Popeye Sees 3-D
(2014)
Director
Celestial Bodies
(2014)
Director
Pygmalion Cubed
(2014)
Director
Cyclops Observes the Celestial Bodies
(2015)
Director
The Lackadaisical Speed of Light
(2015)
Director
Aimless Sightseeing, Seoul
(2015)
Director
Zazie Learns About Money
(2015)
Director
Chrysalis
(2015)
Director
Reichstag 9/11
(2016)
Director
I'm Telling You
(2016)
Director
Hydroelectric Dam
(2016)
Director
Lurking
(2016)
Director
Molten Landscape
(2016)
Director
Ken Jacobs / diNMachine @ The Nervous Magic Lantern Festival
(2016)
Director
Ken Jacobs / JG Thirlwell @ The Nervous Magic Lantern Festival
(2016)
Director
Ken Jacobs / Ghosts Of The Holy Ghost Spermic Brotherhood @ The Nervous Magic Lantern Festival
(2016)
Director
Ken Jacobs / Rick Reed & Tara Bhattacharya @ The Nervous Magic Lantern Festival
(2016)
Director
Ken Jacobs / Robert Poss @The Nervous Magic Lantern Festival
(2016)
Director
Ken Jacobs / Victoria Keddie @ The Nervous Magic Lantern Festival
(2016)
Director
Ken Jacobs / Tom Chiu of Flux Quartet @ The Nervous Magic Lantern Festival
(2016)
Director
Windbreaker
(2017)
Director
Ulysses in the Subway
(2017)
Director
Shelley Duvall is Olive Oyl
(2017)
Director
Get Up and Go
(2017)
Director
A Spin Through Night City
(2017)
Director
Along the Elevated
(2017)
Director
Swee’pea’s Favorite Eternalisms
(2017)
Director
The Moments: Evening Boat Ride
(2018)
Director
Details of Pollock's White Light
(2019)
Director
Joan Mitchell: Departures
(2019)
Director
Once Upon a Planet
(2019)
Director
The Sky Socialist: The Environs
(2019)
Director
Above the Rain
(2019)
Director
THE WHOLE SHEBANG
(2019)
Director
Things to Come
(2019)
Director
Sebastian and Jonas Leaving the Party
(2019)
Director
Failure
(2019)
Director
CRUSH
(2019)
Director
Figures I - V
(2019)
Director
PAPPY SEES 3D, TOO
(2019)
Director
MOVING ROAD
(2019)
Director
Chaos Is Order Misunderstood
(2019)
Director
Cartoon
(2019)
Director
Nervous Magic Lantern: 3D for One or Two Naked Eyes
(2019)
Director
Dimsum and Dragons
(2019)
Director
Rubble
(2020)
Director
Rain Clouds
(2020)
Director
RECIPROCAL
(2020)
Director
Red Green
(2020)
Director
Ken and Flo
(2020)
Director
PAINTED POSTER
(2020)
Director
DR. TOOTHY
(2020)
Director
Barber
(2020)
Director
Foliage in Moving Car Window
(2020)
Director
Facade with Face
(2020)
Director
Doyer Street
(2020)
Director
Sleeping American
(2020)
Director
DeKooning Passed
(2020)
Director
Bison
(2020)
Director
Friendly Building
(2020)
Director
Working Girls (short)
(2020)
Director
Bargains
(2020)
Director
City Foliage
(2020)
Director
Waiting Room Window
(2020)
Director
Natural Collage
(2020)
Director
Reading Society
(2020)
Director
Roots of Manhattan
(2020)
Director
Lazy City
(2020)
Director
Brick Building with Red and Green Windows
(2020)
Director
Broadway Building
(2020)
Director
Fire Escape
(2020)
Director
Duck
(2020)
Director
Chinese New Years
(2020)
Director
Chinese New Years II
(2020)
Director
Broadway Buildings II
(2020)
Director
Broadway Buildings III
(2020)
Director
Neon Sign
(2020)
Director
Flowers and Bike
(2020)
Director
Street Commerce
(2020)
Director
Resting Merchant
(2020)
Director
Street Commerce II
(2020)
Director
Period Piece
(2020)
Director
Garage Wall
(2020)
Director
Another Day in Days of Yore
(2020)
Director
Halley’s Comet
(2020)
Director
Water Balloon
(2020)
Director
Spaceworks
(2020)
Director
Hubble II
(2020)
Director
Whirlpool
(2020)
Director
Bandit
(2020)
Director
Municipal Building Passage
(2020)
Director
Clouds and Trees
(2020)
Director
Storefront
(2020)
Director
Transparent Apartments
(2020)
Director
Spiky
(2020)
Director
Movie That Invites Pausing
(2020)
Director
Double Wow
(2021)
Director
Abstract Eternalism
(2021)
Director
Eternal Beach
(2021)
Director
XCXHXEXRXRXIXEXSX
(2021)
Director
Aspiring To Music
(2021)
Director
Cartoonish 1-10
(2021)
Director
A Small Misunderstanding
(2021)
Director
Adventures of Cookie Truck
(2021)
Director
Hoffman Student
(2021)
Director
Buster Keaton Embossed
(2022)
Director
Sergei Eisenstein Embossed
(2022)
Director
Real Action Figures
(2022)
Director
When Timofeev Moves Everything Moves
(2022)
Director
America Let's Her Hair Down 1905
(2022)
Director
From Introduction to Orson Welles’s Falstaff: Chimes at Midnight
(2023)
Director
Other Urban Lives
(2023)
Director
Writhing City
(2023)
Director
Spasm
(2023)
Director
Book of Eternalisms 1-6
(2023)
Director
Whims of Twenty Twenty-Three
(2023)
Director
One Dozen Roses
(2023)
Director
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
(2023)
Director
Up the Illusion
(2023)
Director
Tourists of the Familiar 1
(2023)
Director
Tourists of the Familiar 5
(2023)
Director
Tourists of the Familiar 10
(2023)
Director
Tourists of the Familiar 15
(2023)
Director
Tourists of the Familiar 20
(2023)
Director
Acting
Scotch Tape
(1962)
Blonde Cobra
(1963)
Bill's Hat
(1967)
Diaries, Notes, and Sketches
(1968)
Self
Huge Pupils
(1968)
Himself
Lost, Lost, Lost
(1976)
Self
Home Movies 1971-81
(1985)
He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life
(1986)
Self
Quartet Number One
(1991)
Jonas in the Desert
(1994)
Self
Birth of a Nation
(1997)
Self
As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty
(2000)
Self
Shorts From the Underground
(2002)
himself
Star Spangled to Death
(2004)
Oscar Friendly / Ringmaster / Janitor
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis
(2007)
Self
Momma's Man
(2008)
Dad
Santos Dumont: Pré-Cineasta?
(2010)
Himself
Lavender
(2010)
Self
Free Radicals: A History of Experimental Film
(2011)
Himself
Cinematic Correspondences: Jonas Mekas - J.L. Guerin
(2011)
Himself
Sleepless Nights Stories
(2011)
Self
Emma's Dilemma
(2012)
Himself
What Is Cinema?
(2013)
Self
Reminiscences of Jonas Mekas
(2016)
Fragments of Paradise
(2022)
Self
Please Leave a Message: Anthology Film Archives Voicemails Through the Ages
(2022)
Editing
Window
(1964)
Editor
Star Spangled to Death
(2004)
Editor
Celestial Subway Lines/Salvaging Noise
(2005)
Editor
A Loft
(2010)
Editor
XCXHXEXRXRXIXEXSX
(2021)
Editor
Crew
Window
(1964)
Cinematography
Star Spangled to Death
(2004)
Cinematography
Joys of Waiting for the Broadway Bus #2
(2013)
Technical Supervisor
Production
Window
(1964)
Producer
Celestial Subway Lines/Salvaging Noise
(2005)
Producer
New York Ghetto Fishmarket 1903
(2007)
Producer
Writing
Opening the Nineteenth Century: 1896
(1991)
Writer
Keaton's Cops
(1991)
Writer
Star Spangled to Death
(2004)
Writer
Spiral Nebula
(2005)
Writer
The Day Was a Scorcher
(2009)
Writer
The Pushcarts Leave Eternity Street
(2011)
Writer
Another Occupation
(2011)
Writer
Cyclops Observes the Celestial Bodies
(2015)
Writer
Camera