A 2020 videopoem by regular collaborators Jean Coulombe (text, images) and Gilbert Sévigny (images, editing, sound). I’d meant to share it at the time, but I do enjoy looking at wintry shots in the middle of summer: a natural surrealism. As a long-time blogger, I also love the fact that Coulombe and Sévigny make their videopoems primarily to provide content for a group blog called CLS Poésie, which has been around since 2009 — as long as Moving Poems. They describe their collective as a
Free association of unclassifiable poets, broadcasting via a blog (which never sleeps) texts, photos and video-poems of a poetry on edge, with blues, neo-country and urban trash accents… (Association libre de poètes inclassables, diffusant par le biais d’un blogue (qui ne dort jamais) des textes, photos et vidéo-poèmes d’une poésie à fleur de peau, aux accents blues, néo-country autant que trash-urbains…)
This is only the sixth videopoem of theirs we’ve shared. Check out the others, but be sure to spend some time on their Vimeo page and discover your own favorites.
A videopoem by Montréal-based filmmaker Mériol Lehmann with text by Sylvain Campeau. Click on the CC icon for subtitles in English or Spanish. I found the English translation by Peter Schulman rather too reliant on cognates for my taste, but was seduced nonetheless by the juxtaposition of landscape and domestic spaces, as well as the contrast between the fast-flowing recitation (by Pierre C. Girard) and the slow panning shots and glacial music.
so we too open our lips
to mouth our prayers
like water over stones
This recent videopoem by Erica Goss incorporates a text by Canadian poet Al Rempel, voiced by Annelyse Gelman, herself a videopoet. As Erica’s Vimeo description notes, “This is the second collaboration between poet Al Rempel and me. […] I used some of my photographs from years ago and video I took last summer.”
Their first collaboration came out last spring: I’ve in the Rain. This new one has a certain New Year’s flavor to it, I thought — a good way to kick off 2021 at Moving Poems.