Underground Cinema 12 was a midnight movie screening series of underground films that ran in theaters owned by Louis Sher, who founded “the nation’s largest circuit of art houses” in 1954. While Sher was the head of the Art Theatre Guild, Underground Cinema 12 was run by his nephew Mike Getz. The series began at […]

This is Part Two in a series about Chicago’s Experimental Film Coalition; and covers their screening series. Formed in 1983, the Experimental Film Coalition started holding regular monthly screenings starting in 1984. The screenings brought to Chicago the work of independent, experimental filmmakers across the country, as well as screening local work.

1963 was a pivotal year in the history of avant-garde film in the United States. In Visionary Film, P. Adams Sitney calls it “the high point of the mythopoeic development within the American avant-garde.”

In 1966, as the underground film wave was sweeping the country, a Boston off-shoot of New York City’s Film-Makers’ Cinematheque opened at a performance space at 53 Berkeley Street. Underground films were shown on weeknights, while on the weekends the space transformed into a music venue called The Boston Tea Party.

Thanatopsis by Ed Emshwiller. Made 1960-62, according to Sheldon Renan’s An Introduction to the American Underground Film.

Twelve American filmmakers will receive a total of $118,500 from the Ford Foundation in its first move to aid creative artists in motion pictures. The grants range up to $10,000 for a one-year period. They will be used by the recipients either to produce short films or for travel and study.

Jan. 21, 1968: This condescending article belittles several underground films that have achieved classic status since, such as Blazes and Christmas on Earth.

Feb. 5, 1966: A celebration of underground filmmakers applying art techniques from other mediums to film, such as Andy Warhol and Bruce Conner.

Here’s a list of filmmakers that author Sheldon Renan wrote bios for in his seminal ’67 book An Introduction to the American Underground Film.

From 1986 to 1996, the American Film Institute gave out the Maya Deren award to underground film artists like Kenneth Anger and Shirley Clarke.