title: Larry Gottheim
text: # Larry Gottheim
  
  Larry Gottheim (born 1936) is an American avant-garde filmmaker.
  
  ## Early life
  
  Gottheim was born December 3, 1936. He attended a high school for music and the arts.
  
  Gottheim went to Oberlin College for undergraduate studies, where he became interested in poetry and fiction. He earned a Ph.D. in comparative literature at Yale University.
  
  ## Career
  
  Gottheim became a faculty member at Binghamton University, where he began teaching literature. He purchased a Bolex camera and began learning how to make films. In 1969 Gottheim brought filmmaker Ken Jacobs to Binghamton, and they established a film department, the first in the SUNY system. His Elective Affinities series, named after the novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, is a collection of four films: Mouches Volantes, Four Shadows, Tree of Knowledge, and Natural Selection.
  
  ## Filmography
  
  * Blues (1970)
  * Fog Line (1970)
  * Corn (1970)
  * Doorway (1971)
  * Thought (1971)
  * Harmonica (1971)
  * Barn Rushes (1971)
  * Horizons (1973)
  * Mouches Volantes (1976)
  * Four Shadows (1978)
  * Tree of Knowledge (1981)
  * Natural Selection (1984)
  * Sorry / Hear Us (1986)
  * Mnemosyne Mother of Muses (1987)
  * The Red Thread (1987)
  * Machette Gillette... Mama (1989)
  * Your Television Traveler (1991)
  * Chants and Dances for Hand (2016)
  