Jonas Mekas on Markopoulos

Jonas Mekas on Markopoulos

A previously unpublished diary entry by Jonas Mekas has been published by The Brooklyn Rail to run alongside Markopoulos’ important essay “Towards a Complete Order” (1974). In this text, Markopoulos writes about the moment in which he decides to re-edit his entire body of work into what became Eniaios. “… the prints that now exist have become but work prints, a fitting jest to the speculators of my work, known and unknown.”

Jonas Mekas was one of Markopoulos’ most faithful and enthusiastic supporters. In his diary entry, which dates from 1965, Mekas recalls Markopoulos’ extraordinary and assured method of editing – “Gregory was editing, with film strips hanging down from the ceiling to the floor, so that the south side of his room looked like a willow tree …” – perfectly describing the photograph by Jerome Hiler that appears on the cover of Film as Film.

These articles appear in the Dec/Jan print issue of The Brooklyn Rail but are also online here.