I came to America in 1922 as Eleanora Derenkowsky. Together
with my father, a psychiatrist --and my mother, an artist, I fled the persecutions
against Russian Jews. I studied journalism and political science in at Syracuse University in New York , finishing my B.A up at NYU in June 1936,
and then received my Master's degree in English literature from Smith in 1939.
In 1943 I made my first film with Alexander Hammid called "Meshes of
the Afternoon "(1943). Through this association I changed my name
to Maya at Hammid's suggestion--Maya, a Buddhist term meaning 'illusion'. I made six short films: "Meshes of the Afternoon" (1943), " At Land" (1944), "A Study for Choreography for Camera" (1945),"Ritual in Transfigured Time"(1945-1946), "Meditation on Violence" (1947), "The Very Eye of Night"(1959) and several incomplete films including one with Marcel Duchamp entitled "The Witches Cradle" ( 1944).I'm the author of two books: "An Anagram of Ideas on Art, Form and Film" 1946 (reprinted in The Legend Of Maya Deren, vol 1, part 2)
and " Divine Horsemen : The Living Gods of Haiti " (1953)
--a book that was made after my first trip to Haiti in 1947 and which is still considered one of the most useful on Haitian Voudoun.
I wrote numerous articles on film and on Haiti .
I shot over 18,000 feet in Haiti from 1947-1954 on Haitian Voudoun.
I was the first filmmaker to receive a Guggenheim for creative work in motion pictures (1947). I wrote film theory, distributed my own films, traveled across the USA and to Cuba and Canada to promote my films using the lecture-demonstration format to inform on film theory as well as Voudoun and the interrelationship of magic, science and religion. I established the Creative Film Foundation in the late 1950's to reward the achievements of independent filmmakers.
