Posts By Dave Bonta
What do animals dream? by Yahia Lababidi
http://vimeo.com/27277431
Another collaboration between the Belgian artist Swoon (videotreats, editing, music and production) and Egyptian writer Yahia Lababidi (poem and reading). Arlekeno Anselmo provided additional whispering and speaking voice in Dutch.
(Updated version of the video. Selected for and screened at Bideodromo, Bilbao (Spain), 2011; selected for and screened at Visible Verse, Vancouver, 2011; and screened at the Neustadt Festival, Oklahoma, 2011.)
Announcing Moving Poem’s first videopoem contest
UPDATE (4/26): We have winnners! There were seven finalists in all. See contest winners 1 and contest winners 2.
1. The gist
In order to showcase and celebrate diverse approaches to making videopoems and poetry-films, I thought it would be fun to have a contest where everyone would use the same poem in its entirety, either in the soundtrack or as text (or both). Please join us! Post the results to YouTube or Vimeo and either email me the link (bontasaurus[at]yahoo[dot]com) or put it in a comment below, no later than April 15 April 22. I’ll post the winners to the main site.
2. The poem
Fable
by Howie Good
A messenger arrived
from a countrycolonized by magpies.
I have two sons, he said,one whose name
means wolfand one whose name
means laughter.It felt like rain,
what’s calleda baby’s ear moon,
false angel wing.They hanged him
in a cornfield.The world is made
of tiny struggling things.
from Rumble Strip (Propaganda Press, 2010)
3. The nitty-gritty
Howie Good is the author of 27 (!) print and digital chapbooks and three full-length collections of poetry, not to mention the 12 scholarly books he’s written in his other career as a journalism professor, which include several studies of film. For a fuller bio and links to some of his online work, see his blog, Apocalypse Mambo. I am grateful to Howie for giving us carte blanche to interpret his poem however we want.
As stipulated above, I’d like all videos to include the complete poem. They should be true videos or films — no video slideshows, please. You should also have permission for any images, footage, and sounds you might use, or be able to make a strong case that (for U.S. material) your use of copyrighted material is sufficiently transformative as to fall under generally accepted definitions of fair use. Please include Howie Good’s name and a link to his blog in the video description at YouTube or Vimeo.
For details about fair use and loads of links to free-to-use video and audio, please refer to our new page: Web resources for videopoem makers. Of course, I encourage those with the means to do so to shoot fresh footage, compose or mix your own music, etc. But if all you have access to is some free video- and audio-editing software and lots of time and imagination, you can still contribute.
You can enter as many times as you like. From all the entries, we’ll select an indeterminate number of finalists to feature on the main site. Howie has offered to give copies of his books Rumble Strip, Anomalies, and Disaster Mode to his top three favorites, with the first place winner getting all three, second place the first two, and third place getting the last. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, I’d love to hear them.
Orphans by Raymond Luczak
The description at YouTube:
Why do so many Deaf people seem so clannish? In this clip, Raymond Luczak explains why in a poem from his book MUTE (A Midsummer Night’s Press). Naturally, it’s subtitled for those who don’t know American Sign Language (ASL).
I’m putting this in the Spoken Word category even though it’s clearly unspoken word. For more on the poet, check out his website. Luczak is also a filmmaker, with two documentaries and two ASL storytelling collections under his belt. Thanks to Nic at Voice Alpha, a blog devoted to the art and science of reading poetry, for this great find.
New directories: poetry film festivals, and free-to-use audio and video
I’ve just posted two new pages of resources for videopoem and poetry-film makers.
The Poetry film festival list includes websites and, where available, Facebook pages for regularly occurring poetry film festivals. Left off the list, at least for now, are all the more general film festivals to which poetry films might be submitted.
Web resources for videopoem makers includes information on determining what’s free to use, as well as links to free and Creative Commons-licensed film and video, spoken word, sound and music collections. I also include a link to the software I use for downloading videos from the web, but I welcome other suggestions.
Please use the comments here or at the respective pages to alert me about other links I should include. I would also encourage people who regularly use Creative Commons-licensed material to follow the Golden Rule and apply a “copyleft” license to your own work, as well. (I don’t always remember to do this myself, but I should.)
We’ll Go No More A-Roving, by Lord Byron
An amusing interpretation of Lord Byron’s ballad, directed by Kevin Jackson. (See Vimeo for the rest of the credits.) I was expecting some melodramatic ending, but thankfully that didn’t happen, and I ended up admiring this remix of a classic.
May by Karel Hynek Mácha
This is The Tone of a Broken Harp, The Sound of a Snapped String performed by the composer, Jiří Kadeřábek, and Fourbythree. It uses two brief excerpts from the poem, which may be read in its entirety here. Kadeřábek writes,
This piece is inspired by the dark, almost decadent level of the Czech romantic poem May by Karel Hynek Mácha. Poetic images of love and spring nature mix with description of ruin, despair and death. The quotations, used in the piece as well as in its title, have been taken from the latest English translation of the poem. The concept of the piece as well as the exact image of the video came to me, when I suddenly and unusually took a nap one afternoon.
My spirit – my spirit – and my soul!
that’s how his words, each one distinct,
escape from his clenched lips.
Before the voice reaches the ear
these awful words are once more nothing –
they die – as they were born.It was late evening – first of May
was evening – the time for love.
The turtledove invited love
to where the pine grove’s fragrance lay.
The video is as effective as the music, I thought. It was put together by Avion Film and Sound Postproduction in Prague.
Interview with “How Pedestrian” curator Katherine Leyton
Nic S. at Voice Alpha interviews Katherine Leyton, who stops people on the street and gets them to read poems on camera for her site How Pedestrian.
The visual element of the project, of course, was the main idea. I wanted to bring poetry to people in pubs and streets and taxis around Toronto, capture it on video and post it online. However, the visual aspect of a poem itself is also very important, and I think to fully absorb a poem you need to actually read it; this is why I decided to post the work next to the video. I really wanted the viewer be able to read along.
One of the most surprising results of the project so far has been the overwhelmingly positive public response.
The enthusiasm with which pedestrians agree to read for me is astonishing. I would say that out of every ten people I ask to read a poem, nine say yes. When I started, I never expected a 90% response rate, which speaks of my own misperceptions about the way the Canadian public views poetry. People are willing and curious, they just might not be inspired to seek it out on their own – they need a push. Many of my readers want to discuss the poem or poet with me after they read, and almost all are fascinated by the project.
The Carcass (Une Charogne) by Charles Baudelaire
A mesmerizing film and reading in French, with the English translation by Geoffrey Wagner provided in subtitles. I am guessing that the filmmaker, Koustoz, is Greek.
