The American Film Institute Award for Independent Film and Video Artists, subtitled and generally known as the Maya Deren Award, was an award presented to filmmakers and video artists by the

American Film Institute The American Film Institute (AFI) is an American nonprofit film organization that educates filmmakers and honors the heritage of the History of cinema in the United States, motion picture arts in the United States. AFI is supported by private fu ...

to honor independent filmmaking. Named for the avant-garde experimental film artist Maya Deren, it was given from 1986 through 1996.

History

Created by the

in 1985, the Maya Deren Award was first presented on January 30, 1986, at the Tower Gallery in

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. The inaugural recipients were video artist

Nam June Paik Nam June Paik (; July 20, 1932 – January 29, 2006) was a South Korean artist. He worked with a variety of media and is considered to be the founder of video art. He is credited with the first use (1974) of the term "electronic super highway" ...

, experimental filmmaker

Stan Brakhage James Stanley Brakhage ( ; January 14, 1933 – March 9, 2003) was an American experimental filmmaker. He is considered to be one of the most important figures in 20th-century experimental film. Over the course of five decades, Brakhage cr ...

and animator Sally Cruikshank. The initial co-chairpersons of the AFI's committee for the award were two board members, actress

Marsha Mason Marsha Mason (born April 3, 1942) is an American actress and theatre director. She has been nominated four times for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performances in '' Cinderella Liberty'' (1973), '' The Goodbye Girl'' (1977), '' Chap ...

and independent film exhibitor Karen Cooper. The award included a $5,000 honorarium.

Recipients

*1986:

, Sally Cruikshank. Presented January 30, 1986. *1987:

Dara Birnbaum Dara Nan Birnbaum (October 29, 1946 – May 2, 2025) was an American video and installation artist based in New York City. Birnbaum entered the nascent field of video art in the mid-to-late 1970s, challenging the gendered biases of the period ...

, Robert Breer,

Ed Emshwiller Edmund Alexander Emshwiller (February 16, 1925 – July 27, 1990) was an American people, American visual artist notable for his science fiction illustrations and his pioneering experimental films. He usually signed his illustrations as Emsh but ...

*1988:

Bruce Conner Bruce Conner (November 18, 1933 – July 7, 2008) was an American artist who worked with assemblage, film, drawing, sculpture, painting, collage, and photography. Biography Bruce Conner was born November 18, 1933, in McPherson, Kansas. His w ...

Yvonne Rainer Yvonne Rainer (born November 24, 1934) is an American dancer, choreographer, and filmmaker, whose work in these disciplines is regarded as challenging and experimental.

Bill Viola William John Viola Jr. ( , ; January 25, 1951 – July 12, 2024) was an American video artist whose artistic expression depended upon electronic, sound, and image technology in new media. His works focus on the ideas behind fundamental human ...

. Presented February 3, 1988. :::Citation given to

J. Hoberman James Lewis Hoberman (born March 14, 1949) is an American film critic, journalist, author and academic. He began working at ''The Village Voice'' in the 1970s, became a full-time staff writer in 1983, and was the newspaper's senior film critic f ...

, film critic for ''

The Village Voice ''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture publication based in Greenwich Village, New York City, known for being the country's first Alternative newspaper, alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf (publisher), Dan Wolf, ...

'', for contributions to independent film and video. *1989:

James Broughton James Broughton (November 10, 1913 – May 17, 1999) was an American poet and poetic filmmaker. He was part of the San Francisco Renaissance, a precursor to the Beat poets. Broughton was an early bard of the Radical Faeries, as well as a member ...

Shirley Clarke Shirley Clarke (née Brimberg; October 2, 1919 – September 23, 1997) was an American filmmaker. Life Born Shirley Brimberg in New York City, she was the daughter of a Polish-immigrant father who made his fortune in manufacturing. Her mother w ...

Joan Jonas Joan Jonas (born July 13, 1936) is an American visual artist and a pioneer of video and performance art, "a central figure in the performance art movement of the late 1960s".Les Blank Les Blank (November 27, 1935 – April 7, 2013) was an American documentary filmmaker best known for his portraits of American traditional musicians. Life and career Leslie Harrod Blank Jr. was born November 27, 1935, in Tampa, Florida. He atten ...

, Ernie Gehr, Edin Velez *1991: Bruce Baillie, Charles Burnett,

Trinh T. Minh-ha Trinh T. Minh-ha (born 1952 in Hanoi; Vietnamese: Trịnh Thị Minh Hà) is a Vietnamese filmmaker, writer, literary theorist, composer, and professor. She has been making films since the 1980s and is best known for her films Reassemblage (film ...

. Presented at the

Angelika Film Center Angelika Film Center is a movie theater chain in the United States that features independent and foreign films. It operates theaters in New York City, Texas, Washington, D.C., California, and Virginia. Its headquarters are in New York City. ...

. *1992:

George Kuchar George Kuchar (August 31, 1942 – September 6, 2011) was an American underground film film director, director and video artist, known for his "low-fi" aesthetic. Early life and career Kuchar trained as a commercial artist at the School of Indust ...

Marlon Riggs Marlon Troy Riggs (February 3, 1957 – April 5, 1994) was a Black gay filmmaker, educator, poet, and activist. He produced, wrote, and directed several documentary films, including '' Ethnic Notions'', '' Tongues Untied'', '' Color Adjustment'' ...

, Steina Vasulka *1993:

Julie Dash Julie Ethel Dash (born October 22, 1952) is an American filmmaker, music video and commercial director, author, and website producer. Dash received her Master of Fine Arts, MFA in 1985 at the UCLA Film School and is one of the graduates and filmm ...

, Pat O'Neill,

Bruce The English language name Bruce arrived in Scotland with the Normans, from the place name Brix, Manche in Normandy, France, meaning "the willowlands". Initially promulgated via the descendants of king Robert the Bruce (1274−1329), it has been ...

and Norman Yonemoto *1994:

Ken Jacobs Ken Jacobs (born May 25, 1933 in Brooklyn, New York) is an American experimental filmmaker. His style often involves the use of found footage which he edits and manipulates. He has also directed films using his own footage. Ken Jacobs directed ...

Barbara Kopple Barbara Kopple (born July 30, 1946) is an American film director known primarily for her documentary work. She is credited with pioneering a renaissance of cinema vérité, and bringing the historic French style to a modern American audience. S ...

, Julie Zando *1995:

Richard Leacock Richard Leacock (18 July 192123 March 2011)
The Telegraph (Lon ...

Victor Masayesva, Shigeko Kubota *1996:

Kenneth Anger Kenneth Anger (born Kenneth Wilbur Anglemyer, February 3, 1927 – May 11, 2023) was an American Underground film, underground experimental filmmaker, actor, and writer. Working exclusively in short films, he produced almost 40 works beginning i ...

, Leslie Thornton, Chick StrandUnderground Film History: AFI’s Maya Deren Award, Underground Film Journal
/ref>

References

{{Maya Deren, state=collapsed American film awards Experimental film American Film Institute Awards established in 1986 Awards disestablished in 1996