60 Avant-Garde/Experimental Directors

1. Alain Robbe-Grillet

Born in Brest, France, in 1922, Alain Robbe-Grillet initially studied mathematics and biology. He graduated from the Paris-based Institut National Agronomique (National Institute of Agronomy) in 1945 and embarked on a career of scientific research in the tropics and in France. Then at age 30 he ...

2. Alejandro Jodorowsky

Writer | El Topo

Alejandro Jodorowsky was born in Tocopilla, Chile on February 17, 1929. In 1939 he moved to Santiago where he attended university, was a circus clown and a puppeteer. In 1953 he went to Paris and studied mime with Marcel Marceau. He worked with Maurice Chevalier there and made a short film, La ...

3. Aleksandr Sokurov

Director | Russkiy kovcheg

He was born with a disability because of an anatomic defect of his leg, in 1951 in Podorvikha village in Siberian Russia. His father was a Red Army veteran of WW2. One of most important contemporary filmmakers, Sokurov worked extensively in television and later graduated from the prestigious film ...

4. Andy Warhol

Director | Blue Movie

Andrew Warhol's father, Ondrej, came from the Austria-Hungary Empire (now Slovakia) in 1912, and sent for his mother, Julia Zavackyová Warholová, in 1921. His father worked as a construction worker and later as a coal miner. Around some time, the family moved to Pittsburgh. During his teenage years...

5. Artavazd Peleshian

Director | La nature

Creator of the "distance montage," Artavazd Peleshian, one of the key Soviet documentary makers, removed the boundaries of feature and documentary films, editing both sequences as a real poetical unity. His "distance montage" was a new step in the development of film editing.

Even his student works ...

6. Bruce Conner

Director | A Class Picture of the CCAC Film Class of '65 Actually Taught by Bruce Conner in the Tradition of Lumière

Bruce Conner was born in McPherson, Kansas, in 1933 and studied art at Wichita University, the University of Nebraska, the Brooklyn Art School, and the University of Colorado. Moving to San Francisco in 1957, Conner became involved with the Beatniks. He continued to live and work in San Francisco, ...

7. Chris Marker

Writer | 12 Monkeys

Chris Marker was born on July 29, 1921 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, Hauts-de-Seine, France. He was a writer and director, known for 12 Monkeys (1995), Sans Soleil (1983) and Third Side of the Coin (1960). He died on July 29, 2012 in Paris, France.

8. Dziga Vertov

Director | Chelovek s kino-apparatom

Dziga Vertov was born on January 2, 1896 in Bialystok, Grodno Governorate, Russian Empire [now Podlaskie, Poland]. He was a director and writer, known for Man with a Movie Camera (1929), Three Songs About Lenin (1934) and The Sixth Part of the World (1926). He was married to Elizaveta Svilova. He ...

9. Ed Emshwiller

Director | Image, Flesh and Voice

After majoring in painting and illustration at the University of Michigan, Ed Emshwiller studied in Paris at the École des Beaux Arts and NYC's Art Students League. An abstract expressionist, he was also a major science fiction illustrator during the 1950s and 1960s, winning Hugo Awards for his ...

10. Gaspar Noé

Director | Enter the Void

Gaspar Noé is an Argentinian filmmaker and screenwriter who lives in France. He is the son of Luis Felipe Noé, an Argentinian artist. He directed I Stand Alone, Irréversible, Enter the Void, Love, Climax, Carne, Lux Æterna, Sodomites and Vortex. His films are known for having a sensory overload ...

11. Germaine Dulac

Director | Âme d'artiste

The daughter of a cavalry captain, she was raised by a grandmother in Paris, where she studied various forms of art with an emphasis on music and the opera. In 1905 she married engineer-novelist Marie-Louis Albert-Dulac and under his influence veered toward journalism. As one of the leading radical...

12. Godfrey Reggio

Director | Koyaanisqatsi

Godfrey Reggio is a pioneer of a film style that creates poetic images of extraordinary emotional impact for audiences worldwide. Reggio is prominent in the film world for his QATSI trilogy, essays of visual images and sound that chronicle the destructive impact of the modern world on the ...

13. Hans Richter

Director | Dreams That Money Can Buy

Hans Richter was born on April 6, 1888 in Berlin, Germany. He was a director and writer, known for Dreams That Money Can Buy (1947), 8 X 8: A Chess Sonata in 8 Movements (1955) and Chesscetera (1957). He was married to Frida Ruppel, Erna Niemeyer, Maria van Vanselow and Elisabeth Steiner. He died ...

14. Harry Smith

Director | Mahagonny

Harry Smith was born on May 29, 1923 in Portland, Oregon, USA. He was a director and writer, known for Mahagonny (1980), Number 8 (1954) and Number 13 (1962). He died on November 26, 1991 in New York City, New York, USA.

15. Hollis Frampton

Director | Not the First Time

Hollis Frampton was born on March 11, 1936 in Wooster, Ohio, USA. He was a director and producer, known for Not the First Time (1976), The Birth of Magellan: Cadenza XIV (1980) and The Birth of Magellan: Mindfall I (1980). He died on March 30, 1984 in New York, USA.

16. Isidore Isou

Actor | Traité de bave et d'éternité

Isidore Isou was born on January 31, 1925 in Botosani, Romania. He was an actor and director, known for Venom and Eternity (1951), Howlings in Favour of De Sade (1952) and Disorder Is 20 Years Old (1967). He died on July 28, 2007 in Paris, France.

17. Jack Smith

Director | Flaming Creatures

Jack Smith was born on November 14, 1932 in Columbus, Ohio, USA. He was an actor and director, known for Flaming Creatures (1963), The Illiac Passion (1967) and Normal Love (1963). He died on September 25, 1989 in Manhattan, New York, USA.

18. James Broughton

Director | The Pleasure Garden

James Broughton was born on November 10, 1913 in Modesto, California, USA. He was a director and writer, known for The Pleasure Garden (1955), The Potted Psalm (1946) and Erogeny (1976). He died on May 17, 1999 in Port Townsend, Washington, USA.

19. James Whitney

Director | Lapis

James Whitney was born on December 27, 1921 in Pasadena, California, USA. He was a director and cinematographer, known for Lapis (1966), Film Exercise 5 (1944) and Film Exercises 2-3 (1944). He died on April 8, 1982 in San Diego, California, USA.

20. Jan Svankmajer

Director | Otesánek

After studying at the Institute of Industrial Arts and the Marionette Faculty of the Prague Academy of Fine Arts in the 1950s, Jan Svankmajer started working as a theatre director, chiefly in association with the Theatre of Masks and the Black Theatre. He first experimented with film-making after ...

21. Jean Cocteau

Writer | La Belle et la Bête

Jean Cocteau was one of the most multi-talented artists of the 20th century. In addition to being a director, he was a poet, novelist, painter, playwright, set designer, and actor. He began writing at 10 and was a published poet by age 16. He collaborated with the "Russian Ballet" company of Sergei...

22. Jean-Luc Godard

Director | Bande à part

Jean-Luc Godard was born in Paris on December 3, 1930, the second of four children in a bourgeois Franco-Swiss family. His father was a doctor who owned a private clinic, and his mother came from a preeminent family of Swiss bankers. During World War II Godard became a naturalized citizen of ...

23. Jean-Marie Straub

Director | Chronik der Anna Magdalena Bach

Jean-Marie Straub was born on January 8, 1933 in Metz, Moselle, Lorraine, France. He was a director and editor, known for The Chronicle of Anna Magdalena Bach (1968), Sicily! (1999) and Class Relations (1984). He was married to Danièle Huillet. He died on November 20, 2022 in Rolle, Switzerland.

24. Jean Rouch

Director | Moi, un noir

Jean Rouch was born on May 31, 1917 in Paris, France. He was a director and cinematographer, known for Moi, un noir (1958), Madame L'Eau (1993) and Six in Paris (1965). He was married to Joselyne Lamothe. He died on February 18, 2004 in Birni N'Konni, Niger.

25. John Waters

Writer | Pecker

Growing up in Baltimore in the 1950s, John Waters was not like other children; he was obsessed by violence and gore, both real and on the screen. With his weird counter-culture friends as his cast, he began making silent 8mm and 16mm films in the mid-'60s; he screened these in rented Baltimore ...

26. Joris Ivens

Director | La Seine a rencontré Paris

Joris Ivens was born on November 18, 1898 in Nijmegen, Gelderland, Netherlands. He was a director and writer, known for La Seine a rencontré Paris (1957), The Mistral (1966) and A Tale of the Wind (1988). He was married to Marceline Loridan Ivens, Helen van Dongen and Germaine Krull. He died...

27. Júlio Bressane

Director | Educação Sentimental

Júlio Bressane was born on February 13, 1946 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He is a director and writer, known for Sentimental Education (2013), Tabu (1982) and A Love Movie (2003).

28. Ken Jacobs

Director | New York Ghetto Fishmarket 1903

Ken Jacobs was born on May 25, 1933 in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA. He is a director and editor, known for New York Ghetto Fishmarket 1903 (2007), Return to the Scene of the Crime (2008) and Star Spangled to Death (2004). He is married to Flo Jacobs. They have two children.

29. Kenneth Anger

Director | Fireworks

Kenneth Anger grew up in Hollywood and started out as a child actor, but his interest in filmmaking was evident at an early age: he made his first film, Who Has Been Rocking My Dreamboat (1941) , at age 14.

Anger developed into one of the pioneers of the American underground film movement. His ...

30. Kurt Kren

Director | 8/64: Ana - Aktion Brus

Kurt Kren was born on September 20, 1929 in Vienna, Austria. He was a director and cinematographer, known for 8/64: Ana - Aktion Brus (1964), 16/67: 20. September (1967) and 10b/65: Silber - Aktion Brus (1965). He died on June 23, 1998 in Vienna, Austria.

31. Len Lye

Director | Crusade in Europe

Len Lye was born on July 5, 1901 in Christchurch, New Zealand. He was a director and writer, known for Crusade in Europe (1949), N or NW (1938) and He Loved an Actress (1938). He was married to Annette Zeiss and Jane Florence Winifred Thompson. He died on May 15, 1980 in Warwick, Rhode Island, USA.

32. Lotte Reiniger

Director | Silhouetten

Lotte Reiniger was born on June 2, 1899 in Berlin, Germany. She was a director and writer, known for Silhouetten (1936), Der Graf von Carabas (1935) and Lotte Reiniger - The Fairy Tale Films (1961). She was married to Carl Koch. She died on June 19, 1981 in Dettenhausen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany.

33. Luc Moullet

Director | La comédie du travail

Luc Moullet was born on October 14, 1937 in Paris, France. He is a director and writer, known for La comédie du travail (1988), Les contrebandières (1968) and Le système Zsygmondy (2001).

34. Luis Buñuel

Writer | Le charme discret de la bourgeoisie

The father of cinematic Surrealism and one of the most original directors in the history of the film medium, Luis Buñuel was given a strict Jesuit education (which sowed the seeds of his obsession with both religion and subversive behavior), and subsequently moved to Madrid to study at the ...

35. Marie Menken

Actress | The Life of Juanita Castro

Marie Menken was born on May 25, 1909 in New York City, New York, USA. She was a director and cinematographer, known for The Life of Juanita Castro (1965), The Gravediggers from Guadix (1960) and Prison (1965). She was married to Willard Maas. She died on December 29, 1970 in Brooklyn, New York, ...

36. Martin Arnold

Director | Alone. Life Wastes Andy Hardy

Born 1959 in Vienna. Studied Psychology and History of Art at Vienna University. Free-lance film maker since 1987. Founding member of Sixpack Film. Organisor of several avant-garde film festivals in Vienna. Presentation of a selection of Austrian avant-garde films at American cinematheques in 1990....

37. Maya Deren

Director | Meshes of the Afternoon

Maya Deren came to the USA in 1922 as Eleanora Derenkowsky. Together with her father Solomon Derenkowsky, a psychiatrist, and her mother Maria Fidler, an artist, she fled the pogroms organized by the Bolsheviks against the Jews. She studied journalism and political science at the Syracuse ...

38. Michael Snow

Director | Wavelength

Central figure of the American avant-garde. An artist who made an isolated animated short, A to Z (1956), Snow concentrated on his painting career until moving to New York in 1963. After attending avant-garde film screenings organized by critic-filmmaker Jonas Mekas and turning out a second film, ...

39. Norman McLaren

Producer | Neighbours

Norman McLaren is one of the most awarded filmmakers in the history of Canadian cinema, and a pioneer in both animation and filmmaking. Born in Scotland, he entered the Glasgow School of Fine Arts in 1932 to study set design. His early experiments in animation included actually scratching and ...

40. Oskar Fischinger

Cinematographer | Frau im Mond

Oskar Fischinger was born on June 22, 1900 in Gelnhausen, Hesse, Germany. He was a director, known for Woman in the Moon (1929), Orgelstäbe (1927) and A Quarter Hour of City Statistics (1933). He was married to Elfriede Fischinger. He died on January 31, 1967 in Hollywood, California, USA.

41. Otto Muehl

Actor | Manopsychotisches Ballett

Otto Muehl was born on June 16, 1925 in Grodnau, Burgenland, Austria. He was an actor and director. He was married to Claudia Weissensteiner. He died on May 26, 2013 in Moncarapacho, Olhão, Portugal.

42. Paul Morrissey

Director | Mixed Blood

Born in New York City in 1938, Paul Morrissey studied literature at Fordham University. In the early 1960s, following a stint in the Army and jobs in insurance and as a social worker, he began directing short independent films.

In 1965, he was introduced to Andy Warhol, who asked him to contribute ...

43. Paul Sharits

Director | Fluxfilm Anthology 1962-1970

Paul Sharits was born on February 7, 1943 in Denver, Colorado, USA. He was a director and producer, known for Fluxfilm Anthology 1962-1970 (1971), Figment I: Fluxglam Voyage in Search of the Real Maciunas (1986) and N: O: T: H: I: N: G (1968). He was married to Frances Niekerk. He died on July 15, ...

44. Peter Greenaway

Director | The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover

Peter Greenaway trained as a painter and began working as a film editor for the Central Office of Information in 1965. Shortly afterwards he started to make his own films. He has produced a wealth of short and feature-length films, but also paintings, novels and other books. He has held several ...

45. Peter Kubelka

Director | Mosaik im Vertrauen

Peter Kubelka was born on March 23, 1934 in Vienna, Austria. He is a director and editor, known for Mosaic in Trust (1955), Unsere Afrikareise (1966) and Pause! (1977).

46. Ralph Steiner

Cinematographer | Cafe Universal

Ralph Steiner was born on February 8, 1899 in Cleveland, Ohio, USA. He was a cinematographer and director, known for Cafe Universal (1934), Panther Woman of the Needle Trades, or the Lovely Life of Little Lisa (1931) and Hands (1934). He died in 1986.

47. Robert Breer

Director | What Goes Up

Robert Breer was born on September 30, 1926 in Detroit, Michigan, USA. He was a director and cinematographer, known for What Goes Up (2003), Fuji (1974) and For Life, Against the War (1967). He was married to Kate Flax. He died on August 11, 2011 in Tucson, Arizona, USA.

48. Rogério Sganzerla

Director | O Bandido da Luz Vermelha

Rogério Sganzerla was born on May 4, 1946 in Joaçaba, Santa Catarina, Brazil. He was a director and writer, known for The Red Light Bandit (1968), O Signo do Caos (2005) and A Mulher de Todos (1969). He was married to Helena Ignez. He died on January 9, 2004 in São Paulo, Brazil.

49. Santiago Álvarez

Director | 79 primaveras

Santiago Álvarez was born on March 18, 1919 in Cuba. He was a director and writer, known for 79 primaveras (1969), Hanoi, martes 13 (1968) and El sueño del pongo (1970). He died on May 20, 1998 in Havana, Cuba.

50. Sergei Eisenstein

Director | Ivan Groznyy

The son of an affluent architect, Eisenstein attended the Institute of Civil Engineering in Petrograd as a young man. With the fall of the tsar in 1917, he worked as an engineer for the Red Army. In the following years, Eisenstein joined up with the Moscow Proletkult Theater as a set designer and ...

51. Sergei Parajanov

Director | Tini zabutykh predkiv

One of the 20th century's greatest masters of cinema Sergei Parajanov was born in Georgia to Armenian parents and it was always unlikely that his work would conform to the strict socialist realism that Soviet authorities preferred. After studying film and music, Parajanov became an assistant ...

52. Sidney Peterson

Director | The Lead Shoes

Sidney Peterson was born on November 15, 1905 in Oakland, California, USA. Sidney was a director and writer, known for The Lead Shoes (1949), The Potted Psalm (1946) and Japanese House (1955). Sidney died on April 24, 2000 in New York City, New York, USA.

53. Stan Brakhage

Director | The Loom

Stan Brakhage was born on January 14, 1933 in Kansas City, Missouri, USA. He was a director and cinematographer, known for The Loom (1986), The God of Day Had Gone Down Upon Him (2000) and Visions in Meditation (1990). He was married to Marilyn Jull and Jane Wodening. He died on March 9, 2003 in ...

54. Stan Vanderbeek

Director | A La Mode

Stan Vanderbeek was born on January 6, 1927 in New York City, New York, USA. He was a director and editor, known for A La Mode (1959), Cine Dreams: Future Cinema of the Mind (1972) and Pastorale (1965). He died on September 19, 1984 in Columbia, Maryland, USA.

55. Standish Lawder

Director | Corridor

Standish Lawder was born in 1936 in Connecticut, USA. He was a director and actor, known for Corridor (1970), Raindance (1972) and Dangling Participle (1970). He died on June 21, 2014 in Los Angeles, California, USA.

56. Su Friedrich

Director | Hide and Seek

Su Friedrich is known for Hide and Seek (1996), Sink or Swim (1990) and Gut Renovation (2012).

57. Trinh T. Minh-ha

Director | What About China?

Trinh T. Minh-ha was born in 1952 in Hanoi, Vietnam. She is a director and writer, known for What About China? (2022), Shoot for the Contents (1991) and Night Passage (2004).

58. Vera Chytilová

Director | O necem jiném

Vera Chytilová was born on February 2, 1929, in Ostrava, Czechoslovakia (now Czech Republic). She studied philosophy and architecture in Brno for two years, then worked as a technical draftsman, a designer, a fashion model, a photo re-toucher, then worked as a clapper girl for Barrandov Film ...

59. Walerian Borowczyk

Director | Docteur Jekyll et les femmes

Born in Kwilcz, Poland, Walerian Borowczyk trained as a painter and lithographer, winning Poland's National Prize in 1953. He began his film career as a film poster designer, then started making short animated films in the late 1950s. Moving to France in the early 1960s, he gained a reputation as a...

60. Wladyslaw Starewicz

Director | Zhitel nyeobitayemovo ostrova

Although his name nowadays means very little except to animation buffs (and even they have to be pretty well informed), Wladyslaw Starewicz ranks alongside Walt Disney, as one of the great animation pioneers, and his career started nearly a decade before Disney's. He became an animator by accident ...