Jud Yalkut

Jud Yalkut (/dʒʌd jælkʌt/;1938–2013) was an experimental film and video maker and intermedia artist.

Jud Yalkut was born in New York City in 1938.^[1] In 1973, he moved to Dayton, Ohio, where he lived until his death at the age of 75 in Cincinnati, Ohio on July 23, 2013.^[2]

He was married to Peg Rice.^[2]

Yalkut attended McGill University, Montreal, where he studied poetry, before returning to his place of birth, New York, to take up film-making.^[3] While at McGill, Yalkut and Leonard Cohen were fraternity brothers.^[3]

In 1965 Yalkut became resident film-maker for USCO ('The Company of Us', a media arts collective).^[4] Yalkut created the following films for USCO events in the mid-sixties, some in collaboration with USCO members: Turn, Turn, Turn (USCO did the soundtrack), Ghost Rev, Diffraction Film, and Down By the Riverside.^[5]

Yalkut became interested in psychedelics, and produced a short film in 1966 titled D.M.T. The film featured slides by artist Jackie Cassen, choreography/dancing by Mary McKay, and the voice of Ralph Metzner reading from Timothy Leary's book Psychedelic Prayers: And Other Meditations.^[6]

In 1966 Yalkut started collaborating with Nam June Paik, a working partnership that would continue into the 1970s.^[4] Together, Yalkut and Paik produced hybrid film-video works that combined moving image technologies, electronic manipulations, performance and installation. These works include Videotape Study No. 3 (1967–69), Beatles Electroniques (1966–72) and Cinema Metaphysique (1966–72).^[1][3]

As well as Paik, Yalkut worked with many other New York-based visual and performance artists. For example, in 1966 Yalkut created Moondial Film, an experimental film that documented an "electromedia" happening by Aldo Tambellini.^[3] In 1967, Yalkut made a film of the Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, Kusama’s Self-Obliteration, using multiple dissolves and additional superimpositions.^[3] In 1968, Yalkut collaborated with the dancer and choreographer Trisha Brown, contributing a film to the dance, Planes, for projection onto the performance space. The film included found aerial footage of New York City, rockets launching and microscopic imagery.^[7]

During his time in New York, Yalkut organized film programs for Charlotte Moorman's New York Avant Garde Festivals. He also taught film-making courses at New York University, School of Visual Arts, and the Millennium Film Workshop.^[1][3]

In 1973, Yalkut left New York and started a film and video program at Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio.^[1]

He was one of the founders of Dayton Visual Arts Center.^[1] He taught at Sinclair Community College in Dayton and at Xavier University in Cincinnati.^[2]

• Dream Reels: VideoFilms and Environments by Jud Yalkut, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 2000.^[1]
• Jud Yalkut: Visions and Sur-Realities, University of Dayton, Spring 2013 – a career retrospective.^[1]

In 1968 Kusama’s Self Obliteration, Yalkut's 1967 collaborative film with Yayoi Kusama, won the Fourth International Experimental Film Competition in Belgium.^[8]

Yalkut received six Individual Artist Fellowships and three Artist's Project Grants from the Ohio Arts Council. The Montgomery County Arts and Cultural District honoured him with a Master Individual Artist Fellowship and a Lifetime Achievement Fellowship in 2003.^[2]

Many of Yalkut's films have been preserved by Anthology Film Archives through grants from the National Film Preservation Foundation.^[9]