Ross McLaren


Ross McLaren is a Canadian artist and filmmaker based in New York City.

Biography

McLaren was born in 1953 in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada and graduated with honors from Ontario College of Art, where he also did post-graduate work. He is faculty at Cooper Union, Fordham University and Pratt Institute, and also taught at Millennium Film Workshop in New York City.

Work

Advocacy

Since 1976, McLaren has worked as a filmmaker, scholar, teacher, curator, critic, and community organizer. He founded and was first director of the Funnel Film Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, an institution devoted to the production, exhibition, and distribution of film. As founder/director, McLaren encouraged continued recognition of film—particularly Super 8—in his native country.

Films

His films include: Crash 'n' Burn: the "self-destructive document of Toronto’s eponymous punk club," Wave, Weather Building, Dance of the Sacred Foundation Application , Sex Without Glasses, and the Ann Arbor Film Festival award-winning sensation Summer Camp.
A recipient of such prestigious grants as Ontario and Canada Council awards, McLaren has shown his works worldwide. His films screened at MoMA, Anthology Film Archives, the Menil Collection, the National Film Theatre in London, the Centre Georges Pompidou, the Biennale du Paris, Documenta VI, Jyväskylä University in Finland, and ARKEN Museum of Modern Art in Denmark. His work, which was presented in such esteemed venues as the Edinburgh, Toronto, and Oberhausen Film Festivals, is found in several permanent collections, including that of the American Federation of Arts, New York, the Arts Council of Great Britain, the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Ottawa’s National Film Archives and the National Gallery of Canada.

Selected filmography