Jerry Jofen Explained

Jerry Jofen
Birth Date:1925
Birth Place:Bialystok, Poland
Death Date:1993
Death Place:New York City, United States
Occupation:painter, collagist, filmmaker
Spouse:Ellen

Jerry Jofen (1925–1993) was an American painter, collagist, and experimental filmmaker.

Life and career

Zalman "Jerry" Jofen was born in Bialystok, Poland, to a scholarly rabbinical family. In 1941 he fled with his family to the United States to escape the Nazis, arriving in San Francisco on the last refugee ship from Japan. Later he moved to New York City, where he spent much of his time in Greenwich Village. Starting out as a painter, he began to explore film and other media in the 1960s. Jofen is best known for his part in the New York underground film scene, where he collaborated with artists such as Jack Smith, Ken Jacobs, and Angus MacLise.[1] [2] Few of his films survive, mainly because he had a habit of destroying them or leaving them unfinished.[3] Nevertheless he was a noted experimental filmmaker in his day,[4] making innovative use of superimposition and other techniques, and influencing other artists such as Andy Warhol, Stan Brakhage, Ron Rice, and Barbara Rubin.[5] [6] [7] [8]

In 1965 Jofen's work was included in the New Cinema Festival (also known as the Expanded Cinema Festival), an extensive series of multimedia productions in New York presented by Jonas Mekas and featuring the work of such artists as Robert Rauschenberg and Claes Oldenburg. Mekas was impressed with Jofen, writing in the Village Voice, "The first three programs of the New Cinema Festival – the work of Angus McLise [sic], Nam June Paik, and Jerry Joffen [sic] – dissolved the edges of this art called cinema into a frontiersland mystery."[9] Jofen's entry also made a lasting impression on the playwright Richard Foreman, who recalled it years later as one of his favorites.[10]

Jofen's films include, among others:

He also appears in Jonas Mekas's Film Magazine of the Arts (1963)[15] and Birth of a Nation (1997).[16]

Jofen's technique has been described as "collage-like,"[17] and in fact he has also been recognized as a gifted collagist, his work often compared to that of Kurt Schwitters.[18] [19] Rarely shown during his lifetime, Jofen's collages began attracting more attention after a 1997 showing curated by Klaus Kertess, who wrote, "Jerry Jofen was a migrant in search of light. Collage formed his art and his life. Makeshift procedures and the dispersal of the found and discarded in restless search for coherence, so often endemic to collage, parallel the make-do strategies, vagaries and serendipity of immigrant life."[20]

Jofen's films have been screened at the Museum of Modern Art, the Jewish Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and, more recently, the Anthology Film Archives. His collages are exhibited regularly at the Pavel Zoubek Gallery in New York.

See also

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: artsy.net . Jerry Jofen Artist Biography . 26 October 2014.
  2. Web site: Yale University Library . Guide to the Angus MacLise Sound Recordings . [MacLise] collaborated with several notable artists on multimedia projects, such as Gerard Malanga, Yoko Ono, Jonas Mekas, and Jerry Jofen. . 26 October 2014.
  3. Web site: Angus MacLise: Master of Synthesis . van der Voort . René . Blastitude . 26 October 2014 . See also "Rare Films by Jerry Jofen" at zvents.
  4. Web site: The Village Voice . Village Voice Critics Choose Best Films of 1965 . January 13, 1966 . Mekas . Jonas . One of the most creative areas during last year has been the 'expanded' cinema, 'mixed media' area. I should point out particularly the work of Jerry Joffen [sic]... . 26 October 2014.
  5. Book: O'Pray . Michael . Andy Warhol: Film Factory . 1989 . 41 . 978-0851702438 . British Film Institute.
  6. Book: P. Adams Sitney

    . Sitney . P. Adams (editor) . P. Adams Sitney . Film Culture Reader . 2000 . 978-0815411017 . 331 . Cooper Square Press . Stan Brakhage first realized and pointed out that the major invention of Jerry Joffen [sic], whose indescribable endless film is too seldom seen, was precisely the suggestion of significant action out of the camera's field. Brakhage himself utilized this principle in Song 6 (1964)... . (from "Structural Film" essay by P. Adams Sitney)

  7. Book: Renan . Sheldon . An Introduction to the American Underground Film . 1967 . 978-0525472070 . E. P. Button & Co., Inc. . Jerry Joffen [sic], for example, is known to have influenced the work of such people as Ron Rice..
  8. Web site: Osterweil . Ara . Queer Coupling, or The Stain of the Bearded Woman . 2010 . araosterweil.com . Wayne State University Press . [Barbara Rubin] took superimposition from Jerry Joffen [sic]... . 2014-10-29 . 2014-10-20 . https://web.archive.org/web/20141020065346/http://www.araosterweil.com/download/i/mark_dl/u/4009891857/4561222908/Framework%2051-2.1%20Osterweil%20article.pdf . dead . Osterweil spells his birth name "Zalman Joffen"; his agent and the tribute website use "Jofen."
  9. Web site: Comenas. Gary. Expanded Cinema?. warholstars.org. 31 October 2014.
  10. Book: Richard Foreman and the Ontological-Hysteric Theatre . 1981 . Davy . Kate . 978-0835712200 .
  11. Web site: Angus MacLise Artist Biography . Unterberger . Richie Unterberger . Richie . AllMusic . 26 October 2014.
  12. Web site: Rare Films by Jerry Jofen . zevents.com . 26 October 2014 . https://web.archive.org/web/20141026142348/http://www.zvents.com/new_york_ny/events/show/88195550-rare-films-by-jerry-jofen-by-jerry-jofen . 26 October 2014 . dead .
  13. Web site: Jack Smith in We're Getting On . jerryjofen.com . 26 October 2014.
  14. Web site: Plenary 4: ARCHIVAL SCREENING: Anthology Film Archives and the History of the Documentary Avant Garde . Visible Evidence . 26 October 2014. Includes a blurb by J. Hoberman.
  15. Book: Ball . Gordon . 66 Frames . 1999 . 215 . 978-1566890823 . Coffee House Press.
  16. Web site: Birth of a Nation . The Film-makers Coop . 29 October 2014.
  17. Web site: Pavel Zoubok Gallery, Jerry Jofen, Salvatore Meo, May Wilson - Rough . ArtSlant . 2011 . 26 October 2014.
  18. Web site: Stapled to the Soul: Jerry Jofen, Tomas Lanigan-Schmidt . Kalm . James . artcritical.com . 26 October 2014.
  19. News: Goodrich . John . Cut-and-Paste, Then and Now . The New York Sun . July 3, 2008 . 26 October 2014 . Jerry Jofen's untitled mixed-media collage of 1968 comes closest to the formal vitality of Kurt Schwitters with a vigorous opposition of elements... . See also James Kalm's article at artcritical.com: "Though giving a tip of the hat to Kurt Schwitters, this work elicits authentic Pop rather than the affected version currently in mode." And Peter Frank's review at the AC Institute : "...the late Jerry Jofen's superbly wrought neo-Schwittersian stapled-paper pieces, all rhythm and cartoonish wit tempered with a subtle mordancy and a perfect sense of color and composition."
  20. Web site: Press release for 'Stapled' exhibition . https://archive.today/20141026174233/http://pavelzoubok.com/sites/pavelzoubok/files/webmaster/media/archive/stapled-press_release.html . dead . 26 October 2014 . Pavel Zoubok Gallery . 26 October 2014 .

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