# Jan Haag > Mediated Wiki article. Canonical URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Jan_Haag > Markdown URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Jan_Haag.md > Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_Haag > Source revision: 1357036926 > License: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) {{Short description|American filmmaker, artist and writer (1933–2024)}} {{Infobox person | name = Jan Haag | image = Jan Haag at AFI.png | alt = | caption = Haag speaking at USC in 1973 | birth_name = Jan Marie Smith | birth_date = {{Birth date|1933|12|06}} | birth_place = [Marysville, Washington](/source/Marysville%2C_Washington), U.S. | death_date = {{Death date and age|2024|04|29|1933|12|06}} | death_place = [Shoreline, Washington](/source/Shoreline%2C_Washington), U.S. | other_names = | alma_mater = | occupation = Writer, poet, artist, filmmaker | employer = [American Film Institute](/source/American_Film_Institute), [Pennsylvania State University](/source/Pennsylvania_State_University) | organization = | known_for = Founder of the Directing Workshop for Women at [AFI](/source/American_Film_Institute) | movement = [Feminist](/source/Feminist) | spouse = | awards = | website = {{URL|http://www.janhaag.com/}} }} '''Jan Marie Haag''' ({{nee}} '''Smith'''; December 6, 1933 – April 29, 2024) was an American filmmaker, artist and writer who founded the [Directing Workshop for Women](/source/Directing_Workshop_for_Women) at the [American Film Institute](/source/American_Film_Institute) (AFI) and was known for her innovative contemporary needlepoint canvases and poetry.{{cite web |last1=Abram |first1=MB |title=Jan Haag |url=https://mbabramgalleries.com/pages/jan-haag |website=MB Abram Galleries |accessdate=7 May 2020 |language=en}} ==Early life== Jan Haag (née Smith), born in [Marysville, Washington](/source/Marysville%2C_Washington), grew up in the Pacific Northwest, graduated from Seattle's [Holy Names Academy](/source/Holy_Names_Academy), and went on to study art and painting at [Burnley School for Professional Art](/source/Burnley_School_for_Professional_Art).{{cite web | title = Jan Haag's Bio | first = Jan | last = Haag | date = August 19, 1999 | url = http://www.janhaag.com/JHbio.html | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210201230521/http://janhaag.com/JHbio.html | archive-date = February 1, 2021 }} Haag continued her studies at the [Art Institute of Chicago](/source/Art_Institute_of_Chicago), [Reed College](/source/Reed_College) in Portland, Oregon, [The New School for Social Research](/source/The_New_School_for_Social_Research) in New York, [University of Washington](/source/University_of_Washington), [Pennsylvania State University](/source/Pennsylvania_State_University), [UCLA](/source/UCLA), and [Southwestern University School of Law](/source/Southwestern_University_School_of_Law). Haag also studied painting with [Frederick E. Smith](/source/Frederick_E._Smith), dance with [Eleanor King](/source/Eleanor_King), and singing and tabla with [Ali Akbar Khan](/source/Ali_Akbar_Khan) and [Swapan Chaudhuri](/source/Swapan_Chaudhuri). ==Career== In Seattle, Haag managed poetry readings, an art gallery, and the Shakespeare Workshop for ABC Bookstore. As an actress, she performed in regional theaters during the 1950s and 1960s, and directed plays in Washington, Oregon and California. Haag has exhibited her work in West Coast museums, competitions, and galleries—including the [Seattle Art Museum](/source/Seattle_Art_Museum), the [Frye Museum](/source/Frye_Museum), the [Otto Seligman Gallery](/source/Otto_Seligman_Gallery), and the [Woessner Gallery](/source/Woessner_Gallery). In Los Angeles, Haag served as Film and Television Director for the [John Tracy Clinic](/source/John_Tracy_Clinic), where she directed a series of forty-two films, "Teaching Speech to the Profoundly Deaf," for the [Department of Health, Education, and Welfare](/source/Department_of_Health%2C_Education%2C_and_Welfare).{{cite book | last1 = Smukler | first1 = Maya Montañez | title = Liberating Hollywood: Women Directors and the Feminist Reform of 1970s American Cinema | year = 2019 | publisher = Rutgers University Press | location = New Brunswick, NJ | isbn = 978-0813587479 | url = https://www.liberatinghollywood.com/index.html }} {{cite thesis | last1 = Smukler | first1 = Maya Montañez | author-link1 = Maya Montañez Smukler | title = Working Girls: The History of Women Directors in 1970s Hollywood | date = 2014 | publisher = University of California, Los Angeles | url = https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8ck097nj | quote = A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements of the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Film and Television }} In 1971 she joined the staff of the American Film Institute where, as Director of National Production Programs, she administered the nation's largest film granting program, the [Independent Filmmaker Program](/source/Independent_Filmmaker_Program), funded by the [National Endowment for the Arts](/source/National_Endowment_for_the_Arts). In 1974, concerned that though many women acted in major motion pictures, almost none directed them. Jan Haag was determined to remedy this. She helped recruit Joan Didion, Mathilda Krim and other prominent women leaders to found a sustainable program to encourage and train women directors. With funding from the [Rockefeller Foundation](/source/Rockefeller_Foundation), she founded AFI's landmark [Directing Workshop for Women](/source/Directing_Workshop_for_Women). Understanding the power of celebrity, she encouraged accomplished women—including [Joanne Woodward](/source/Joanne_Woodward), [Lee Grant](/source/Lee_Grant), [Margot Kidder](/source/Margot_Kidder), [Ellen Burstyn](/source/Ellen_Burstyn), [Maya Angelou](/source/Maya_Angelou), [Karen Arthur](/source/Karen_Arthur), [Anne Bancroft](/source/Anne_Bancroft), [Dyan Cannon](/source/Dyan_Cannon), [Julie Phillips](/source/Julie_Phillips), [Kathleen Nolan](/source/Kathleen_Nolan), [Cicely Tyson](/source/Cicely_Tyson), [Brianne Murphy](/source/Brianne_Murphy), [Nessa Hyams](/source/Nessa_Hyams), and [Randa Haines](/source/Randa_Haines) to sit in the director’s chair for the first time. This strategy raised the profile of the program and provided the means to support many lesser knowns, with whom Haag was principally concerned, to develop their directing skills.{{cite book | last1 = Firstenberg | first1 = Jean Picker | title = Becoming AFI: 50 Years Inside the American Film Institute | date = 2017 | publisher = Santa Monica Press | location = Santa Monica, CA | isbn = 9781595807946 | page = chap. 4 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=zj41DwAAQBAJ }}{{cite book | last1 = Aitken | first1 = Ian | title = Encyclopedia of the Documentary Film 3-Volume Set | date = 2013 | publisher = Routledge | location = Hoboken, NJ | isbn = 9781135206208 | page = 36 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=JdSNAQAAQBAJ }} The DWW became the fountainhead back to which the careers of many women, now directing film and television, can be traced. Haag also served on the boards of many film festivals/programs, including the [Bellevue Film Festival](/source/Bellevue_Film_Festival), [Filmex](/source/Filmex), the [Sundance Institute](/source/Sundance_Institute), and the [International Women Filmmakers Symposium](/source/International_Women_Filmmakers_Symposium). Between 1975 and 2008, Haag created twenty-three contemporary needlepoint canvases, working on some of these simultaneously. One work took ten years to complete. The more complex of these canvases required hundreds, sometimes thousands of hours of application. An accomplished painter and poet familiar with different mediums, Haag writes of the textile art medium: “Compared with the roughhouse immediacy of painting and sculpture, one can cite many a rug, tapestry, piece of stitchery which took a year to make or, at times, a decade. Back and back and back, millennia by millennia, the history and lore of weaving/stitchery recedes as we, at the near end of the time scale, proceed -- cloth, grid arts, fractals and computer -- into the future.” Haag explained: “Over the years, working on these pieces has become one of my primary ways of understanding both the world and my experience of it. The works… transmit knowledge. Not only the powerful subjective awareness of light and color, but the pleasure associated with study -- in this case, study of music, astronomy, mathematics, travel, archaeology, and the iconographic, mystical and esoteric traditions of many cultures.”{{cite web |last1=Abram |first1=MB |title=Introduction to Jan Haag |url=https://vimeo.com/13140242 |publisher=Vimeo |accessdate=7 May 2020 |date=6 July 2010}}{{cite web | title = Textile Art by Jan Haag | first = Jan | last = Haag | url = http://janhaag.com/NPtextileart.html | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210202015336/http://janhaag.com/NPtextileart.html | archive-date = February 2, 2021 | website = Jan Haag's Website | access-date = May 2, 2024 }} These textile pieces became a life’s work. Through determined experimentation and applying techniques and iconography learned from a lifetime of travel, including treks on foot alone through India, Korea, China, Thailand, Nepal, Russia and Europe, Haag would forever change the perceptions and possibilities of needlepoint.{{cite web |last1=Abram |first1=MB |title=The Jan Haag Collection |url=https://www.janhaagcollection.com/ |website=The Jan Haag Collection |publisher=MB Abram Galleries |accessdate=7 May 2020}} [Leonore Tawney](/source/Lenore_Tawney) admired Haag’s work and despite failing health traveled from New York to visit her exhibition at the [Seattle Asian Art Museum](/source/Seattle_Asian_Art_Museum). In 1982, Haag retired from AFI to focus on her art and writing. She wrote thousands of poems and gave poetry readings in theaters, museums, libraries, galleries, and private salons. A limited edition of "Amanita Caesarea", a legend, with original drawings by [Roger Landry](/source/Roger_Landry), was published by [Gallery Plus](/source/Gallery_Plus) in Los Angeles. Haag wrote stories, novels, plays, film scripts, articles, essays, and a vast journal—the manuscripts of which are on deposit in Special Collections at the Blagg Huey Library of [Texas Woman's University](/source/Texas_Woman's_University) in [Denton, TX](/source/Denton%2C_TX). Haag's travel stories have appeared in four of the prize-winning ''Traveler's Tales'' series of books: ''India,'' ''A Woman's World,'' ''The Spiritual Gifts of Travel'', and ''Spain''. During a 1991 writer's fellowship at the [Syvenna Foundation](/source/Syvenna_Foundation) in Texas, Haag wrote a novel ''Cantalloc''. In 1992, during a writer's fellowship at [Blue Mountain Center](/source/Blue_Mountain_Center) in New York, she completed ''No Palms'', a California/Texas novel centering on water rights, real estate fraud, and murder. After 50 years of research and study, in 2009, Haag published ''Jocasta'', an original play based on the Oedipus myth seen from Jocasta's point of view. ''Ascesis'', a 600-page volume of poetry, was published in 2014. ==Personal life and death== Haag was married for ten years, 1957-1968, to [John Haag](/source/John_Haag), Professor and Poet-in-Residence at [Pennsylvania State University](/source/Pennsylvania_State_University). Haag spent her last years in Shoreline, in the Seattle metropolitan area. She died in [Shoreline, Washington](/source/Shoreline%2C_Washington), on April 29, 2024, at the age of 90.{{cite news | last = Barnes | first = Mike | title = Jan Haag, Trailblazing Director and Instructor at AFI Women's Directing Workshop, Dies at 71 | url = https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/jan-haag-dead-afi-directing-workshop-women-1235888865/ | work = The Hollywood Reporter | date = May 2, 2024 | archive-url = https://archive.today/20240503035901/https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/jan-haag-dead-afi-directing-workshop-women-1235888865/ | archive-date = May 3, 2024 }} ==Selected works== ;Poetry and Fiction * {{cite book|title=Ascesis|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wPheBAAAQBAJ|year=2014|isbn=9781493170319 | last1=Haag | first1=Jan | publisher=Xlibris Corporation }} * {{cite book|title=The 2011 Poems: Lantern Light|url=http://janhaag.com/PO2011.html|year=2011}} * {{cite book|title=The 1996 Poems|url=http://janhaag.com/PO2011.html|year=2011}} * {{cite book|title=Companion Spirit|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f2ZdzQEACAAJ|year=2006|isbn=9780975442135 | last1=Haag | first1=Jan }} ;Nonfiction * {{cite book|title="A Wedding in Mahabaleshwar" in ''Travelers' Tales India'', edited by James O'Reilly and Larry Habegger|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KW1qZe3xX2IC|year=2009|publisher=Travelers' Tales Inc., Inc|isbn=9781932361797}} * {{cite book|title="There You Are" in ''Eat Pray Love Made Me Do It'', with an introduction by Elizabeth Gilbert|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2xvTCwAAQBAJ|year=2016|publisher=Penguin Publishing Group|isbn=9780399576775}} ==References== {{Reflist}} {{authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Haag, Jan}} Category:1933 births Category:2024 deaths Category:20th-century American textile artists Category:American Film Institute Category:20th-century American women textile artists Category:People from Marysville, Washington Category:21st-century American textile artists Category:21st-century American women textile artists Category:21st-century American poets Category:21st-century American women novelists Category:21st-century American non-fiction writers Category:21st-century American novelists Category:Film directors from Washington (state) Category:American women film directors Category:21st-century American women poets --- Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Jan Haag](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_Haag) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_Haag?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.