Jem Cohen: Difference between revisions

'''Jem Alan Cohen''' (born August 28, 1962) is an [[Afghans|Afghan]]-born [[United States of America|American]] filmmaker based in [[New York City]]. Cohen is especially known for his observational portraits of urban landscapes, blending of media formats ([[16 mm film|sixteen-millimetre]], [[Super 8 mm film|Super 8]], [[videotape]]) and collaborations with musicians.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ifccenter.com/series/movie-nights-with-jem-cohen/ |title=Movie Nights with Jem Cohen – IFC Center |publisher=Ifccenter.com |access-date=2012-09-15}}</ref> He is the recipient of the [[Independent Spirit Award]] for feature filmmaking. "Cohen's films have been broadcast in Europe by the BBC and ZDF/ARTE, and in the United States by the Sundance Channel and P.B.S. They are in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, The Whitney, The National Gallery of Art, and Melbourne's Screen Gallery."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.vdb.org/smackn.acgi$artistdetail?COHENJ|title=Opus Luminis et Hominis...|publisher=Vdb.org|access-date=2012-09-15|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081117104033/http://www.vdb.org/smackn.acgi$artistdetail?COHENJ|archive-date=2008-11-17|url-status=dead}}</ref>

He is the recipient of the [[Independent Spirit Awards|Independent Spirit Award]] for feature filmmaking, and has received grants from the [[John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation|Guggenheim]], [[Creative Capital]], [[Rockefeller Foundation|Rockefeller]] and [[Alpert FoundationsAwards in the Arts|Alpert]] foundations, and the [[National Endowment for the Arts, and other organizations]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://mediaartists.org/content.php?sec=artist&sub=detail&artist_id=121 |title=Jem Cohen - Media Arts Fellow |publisher=Mediaartists.org |access-date=2012-09-15}}</ref>

Cohen was born in [[Kabul]], [[Afghanistan]] where his father was working for Columbia University, Teachers College and the [[United States Agency for International Development]] (U.S.A.I.D.).<ref name=NYT>{{cite web|title=In focus: Jem Cohen on Museum Hours|url=httphttps://www.bfi.org.uk/newsinterviews/in-focus-jem-cohen-museum-hours|access-date=May 26, 2015|work=BFI Film Forever|date=April 14, 2014}}</ref> He graduated from [[Wesleyan University]] in 1984, with a concentration in film and photography.{{cn|date=January 2024}}

Cohen found the mainstream Hollywood film industry incompatible with his sociopolitical and artistic views. By applying the [[do it yourself|D.I.Y.]] ethos of Punk Rock to his film-making approach, he crafted a distinct style in his films through various small gauge formats of Super 8, sixteen-millimetre, and videotape. In an interview with web-site ''The Lamp'', Cohen said, "...it's very inspiring to me, to see people kind of take something outside of the industry, outside of the music industry, and it gave me something of a template to work in film outside of the film industry. And there are certainly strains of punk that are activist and that are kind of oppositional in nature to the dominant mainstream culture... that's very inspiring to me..."{{cn|date=January 2024}}

Cohen's longer works include his feature film, ''[[Museum Hours]]'', ''[[Chain (film)|Chain]]'', and the experimental [[Documentary film|documentary]], ''[[Instrument (film)|Instrument]]'', a portrait of the [[Washington, D.C.|D.C.]] [[punk rock|punk]] band [[Fugazi (band)|Fugazi]] that was ten years in the making. ''[[Benjamin Smoke]]'', about the life of the frontman of the [[Atlanta]], [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]] band [[Smoke (American band)|Smoke]], covers a ten-year arc. Other works of note are ''[[Lost Book Found]]'', his [[Walter Benjamin]]-inspired portrait of New York City, ''[[Buried in Light]]'', a series of connected Central and Eastern European city portraits, and his [[short film]] about the late [[Elliott Smith]], ''[[Lucky 3|Lucky Three]]''. In 2002, Cohen made ''[[Chain X Three]]'', a precursor to the ''Chain'' feature film, which was exhibited as a three-channel installation. His concert film of the Dutch band [[The Ex (band)|The Ex]], ''[[Building a Broken Mousetrap]]'', premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in 2006.{{cn|date=January 2024}}

In 2005, Cohen curated the four-day FUSEBOX Festival in [[Ghent]], [[Belgium]]. A celebratory gathering "at the crossroads of film, music, and activism," participants included [[Guy Picciotto]] of Fugazi, [[Patti Smith]] and [[Tom Verlaine]], [[The Evens]], and a side project of Montreal's [[Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra|Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band]], called Thee Silver Mountain Elegies Play War Radio, which formed for the occasion.{{cn|date=January 2024}}

[[Category:American filmFilm directors from New York City]]