Maya Deren - Director

 Maya Deren who was originally from Russia, moved to the USA in 1922 with her family and it was in New York where she studied at university.

 In1943, Maya made her first film called “Meshes of the afternoon”. She worked on the film alongside Alexander Hammid who is well known for his work in documentary film.  Both Maya and Alexander were the directors/makers of the film as well as acting in them themselves. They were married to each other at the time of making of the film.

  As well of being a film maker, Maya was the author of two books: "An Anagram of Ideas on Art, Form, and Film" in 1964 and “The Living Gods of Haiti" in 1953. Her book about Haiti was documentation about her experiences of her first visit to the country.  She also made a documentary about the country.

  Maya took an anti-mainstream stance when making her films in order to promote the idea of artist license and creative freedom. 


http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0220305/bio - last accessed on 29^th September