Special Screening of „George: The Story of George Maciunas and Fluxus"  

George Maciunas (1931–1978) was the founder of Fluxus, a radical avant-garde art movement of the 20th century. The film traces how the Lithuanian-born iconoclastic polymath assembled an international network of artists, musicians, and poets that provoked social and political change through performance, ready-mades, and artworks aimed at collapsing the boundary of art and life.

From developing the first artist-owned lofts in SoHo, New York, to his attempt to realize a utopian
society on a desolate island in the Caribbean, Maciunas was an uncompromising visionary with a
rebellious sense of humor. What emerges in the film, is a kaleidoscopic, often contradictory but
always revealing portrait of Maciunas’ bold and tragic life. With interviews among over thirty
artists and scholars including Yoko Ono, Jonas Mekas, and Nam June Paik, the film recounts
Maciunas’ mercurial personality, asks questions that remain central to our contemporary moment,
and explores how one can live a meaningful and artful life.

Jeffrey Perkins

Jeffrey Perkins (1941) is an artist and filmmaker living in New York City. In 1963, while  stationed
by the US Air Force in Japan, he struck up a chance friendship with Yoko Ono, which led to an
association over the ensuing decades with John Cage, John Lennon, George Maciunas, Nam June
Paik, and the Fluxus Art Movement.
During the next twenty years he drove a taxi to support his artistic endeavors. Upon a meeting with
Nam June Paik, Perkins was given the title of “the Fluxus cab driver”. He made a film consisting of
audio recordings of conversations and interviews with passengers in a NYC taxi he drove which
became an intimate look into the lives of New Yorkers and passengers as Perkins drove them
around the city. Perkins was included in the Fluxus Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 1992. He has
also worked as a curator for Anthology Film Archives.

Selected Filmography

The Painter Sam Francis, 2008