Maya Deren

Maya Deren (; born Eleonora Solomonovna Derenkovskaya; Russian: Элеонора Соломоновна Деренковская; May 12 [O.S. April 29] 1917 – October 13, 1961) was a Russian-born American experimental filmmaker and important part of the avant-garde in the 1940s and 1950s. Deren was also a choreographer, dancer, film theorist, poet, lecturer, writer, and photographer. The function of film, Deren believed, was to create an experience. She combined her expertise in dance and choreography, ethnography, the Afric…