In 1981, he established a production and distribution company Dark Picture, specializing in new film and video, and thus began his collaboration with Derek Jarman. He produced some of Derek Jarman's most important movies e.g. The Angelic Conversation (1985), The Garden (1990 film) or Blue. He has collaborated also with John Maybury, Hannah Collins, Davide Pepe and Bernard Rudden.[2]
In 2009, James Mackay was a member of a main jury of the Czech queer film festival Mezipatra.[3]