Bateson, “witting” or not, was surrounded by a web of agents, consultants, academics, and think-tankers directly or indirectly on CIA’s payroll — Harold Abramson, Frank Fremont-Smith, George Hunter White, James Mysbergh, James Alexander Ham…[...] She threw raucous, amphetamine-fueled parties at her apartment at 61 Morton Street in Greenwich Village, dancing barefoot to calypso music. Her guest list included Anaïs Nin, Ralph Ellison, Gore Vidal, and Marcel Duchamp.
And, starti…[...] She threw raucous, amphetamine-fueled parties at her apartment at 61 Morton Street in Greenwich Village, dancing barefoot to calypso music. Her guest list included Anaïs Nin, Ralph Ellison, Gore Vidal, and Marcel Duchamp.
And, starti…
Maya Deren
filmmaker · 3 mentions across 1 reading
In this course
Maya Deren appears in the course readings as a pivotal figure in the mid-century avant-garde whose Greenwich Village salon became a nexus where experimental art, psychedelia, and Cold War intelligence networks intersected. The readings position her not as a theorist of these systems but as a social node—her apartment and gatherings evidence the permeable boundary between bohemian creativity and the CIA's broader interest in consciousness, chemistry, and cultural influence during the early Cold War. Her presence in the citations underscores how "Pandaemonium" concerns operate through social networks and embodied practice rather than formal institutions alone.
Background
Maya Deren 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.
Wikipedia →Mentioned in 1 reading
Appears alongside
People mentioned in the same passages — sorted by co-occurrence weight.
Gregory Bateson 2Marcel Duchamp 2Ana Mendieta 1André Breton 1Benjamin Breen 1Frank Fremont-Smith 1George Hunter White 1Harold Abramson 1Irving Janis 1James Alexander Hamilton 1James Mysbergh 1Peggy Guggenheim 1Alexander Hammid 1Anaïs Nin 1Frances Stonor Saunders 1Gore Vidal 1Margaret Mead 1Miklos Legrady 1Ralph Ellison 1