Posts By Dave Bonta
Your Dog Dies by Raymond Carver
When I saw this videopoem by the Spanish director Juan Bullón the other week, I immediately knew I had to include it in a screening I was curating for REELpoetry/Houston TX called Poesía sin fronteras / Poetry Without Borders. Though otherwise focused on Latin American poetry, the theme of the program was “translation, otherness, identity and death in cinepoetry from across the Americas”, and it made sense to close with a gringo poet’s take, especially given how well Bullón’s choice of mirrored images echoed some of the other films in the program. Also, it was good to end on a slightly lighter note than some of the more melancholy, slow-moving films. I’m happy to report that the audience loved it.
As part of the extensive notes in the online version of this program, I asked directors to share any thoughts they might have on translation and/or poetry filmmaking. Here’s what Juan told me:
I’m a Spanish film maker and writer. I write with creative, narrative or poetic intention for about twelve years. I come from the audiovisual world (television and advertising mostly). In recent years I have attended several creative writing workshops. Now, far from audiovisual as a profession, I dedicate myself to writing and coordinate a creative writing workshop in Seville. It is a workshop to experience the fact of creating and feeling literature. We try to go beyond writing or correct narrative, poetic, autobiographical or reflective texts, beyond knowing techniques and writing tricks. Creativity is the goal without end. We give great importance to reading aloud as a way to recognize and work the literary voice of each one, and also, we experiment with the audiovisual format as another way of learning to know how to interpret our texts, to voiceover them, and act on them. Video-poems are another part of the creative process and the recognition of each as an author, it is another way of creative knowledge. The essential is to pose, think and act, and in our case, create from writing to let go and leave our point of view, and be able to share it. And this ability to narrate and tell should be transferable to another means of expression, as another complement, as another revelation of our creative capacity.
Transferring our texts (or those of other authors) to an audiovisual format, relying on the image and music to create these video-poems is a challenge where the fundamental is the literary burden of the text. We do not consider it as a struggle between the greater or lesser relevance of the image, music or text. The written is the important, it’s essential, then, the interpretation and performance of these texts with a suggestive audiovisual dress. The direction and production of these video-poems must be guided by the simplicity and speed of creation in the event that they are self-produced or by taking advantage of what the internet offers with the royalty-free images and music that can be used and shared, with that democratization of the media. In turn, the video-poems we make are posted on the internet for anyone’s free enjoyment, helping to fill in that great library of Babel.
Moving the texts to an audiovisual format is a part of the creative process, a moment of enjoyment and self-knowledge. The important thing is to act, to be and to write it.
Visit Juan Bullón’s YouTube channel to see more of his and his students’ work.
Call for work: Cadence Video Poetry Festival 2020
Cadence: Video Poetry Festival is open for submissions! This annual festival at the Northwest Film Forum in Seattle, Washington will host screenings on April 16 and 17 and is looking for work ranging from adaptations to collaboration to include in the festival. Cadence approaches video poetry as a literary genre presented as visual media that makes new meaning from the combination of text and moving image. Send Cadence your video poetry through March 1 via FilmFreeway.
The foregoing is the (slightly altered) text of a social-media-adapted press release that Chelsea Werner-Jatzke emailed me this week—a good indication, I suspect, of just how well organized this festival is generally. In case you missed it, I interviewed Chelsea and her co-conspirator Rana San last July. See “How to start a major new videopoetry festival: an interview with the co-directors of Cadence.”
Ground-breaking documentary about videopoetry now at Vimeo On Demand
At long last, the documentary Versogramas or Verses&Frames by Galician director Belén Montero—a unique, multicultural look at contemporary videopoetry through the eyes of 14 filmmakers—is available to watch on the web:
We have great news to share with you: Verses&Frames is now available at Vimeo On Demand. Watch it here!
Now you can enjoy the documentary at home, at any time, for a really low price. Moreover, we have released all the different linguistic versions of Verses&Frames, so you can choose five screening possibilities: original version in Galician with Galician subtitles, Spanish version with Spanish subtitles, English version with English subtitles, reduced Spanish and reduced English versions.
This is how it works: For 3€ you can “rent” the screening of the version you choose. It will be available for 24 hours so you can watch the documentary as many times as you want. You can reproduce it on iOS, Android, Apple TV, Roku and Chromecast.
One of our main objectives when producing Verses&Frames has always been to contribute to the knowledge, research, enjoyment and diffusion of videopoetry. As well as the screenings conducted at festivals, museums and television, we believe that this is a good way to deliver the content of the documentary directly to the public, and to share with you all the emotions that videopoetry arises.
So, just a click away: Verses&Frames On Demand.
That rental price in US dollars is just $3.32. The Vimeo description doesn’t include links to the videopoets interviewed in the film, but you can find that on the project’s website (also available in three languages). I wrote a somewhat critical but generally positive review of Versogramas for Poetryfilm Magazine in 2018. I wrote, in part, that
The interviews are creatively shot and well edited, and the interviewees all come across as fascinating people with uniquely unconventional approaches to making poetry and art. There wasn’t one of them whom I didn’t want to immediately track down on the web and watch every one of their videos, and I was pleased by how many of them were new to me, either because their work had never been translated into English, or because they just hadn’t happened to have crossed my radar.
This is testimony to the sheer breadth of the international videopoetry community, I think. It’s impressive that the producers can focus on just one part of the world—Spain, especially the Galician region—add a handful of filmmakers and videopoets from outside that region, and still end up with a highly varied, complete-feeling snapshot of the state of videopoetry in the 21st century.
So go check it out! I know I for one will definitely be watching it again.
Call for Entries: Atticus Review’s 2nd Annual Videopoem Contest
This week Atticus Review, one of the best online magazines to regularly feature videopoems, poetry films, and other multimedia literary works, announced that their second annual videopoem contest is open for submissions. Marc Neys AKA Swoon is the judge.
Atticus Review is happy to announce our second annual Videopoem Contest judged by Swoon. You can submit up to 3 videopoems. The cost for entry is $10. You may submit video files or links to Vimeo or YouTube pages. Please no submissions from former students or close acquaintances of the Contest Judge. The videopoems can be previously published.
First Prize: $250 & Publication
Second Prize: $50 & Publication
Third Prize: Publication
Deadline: January 12th, 20120
Winner Announced: January 31st, 2020
SUBMIT HERE
ABOUT THE JUDGE:
Marc Neys / Swoon / No One
No One is a composer, Swoon a video-artist, and both personas reside in Marc Neys from Belgium.
As one of the leading and most prolific figures in modern videopoetry he made videopoems for and with writers from all over the globe. He inspired new creators through his workshops and showcases on videopoetry.
He creates works with a focus on the purely poetic quality of the moving image in relation to the spoken or written poem. A sophisticated interplay of constructed soundscapes and images with personal reflections. Through a visual language and references to his everyday life, he creates a framework in which the poems come to a different development.
He released 3 CDs over the last two years and his videos have been selected and featured at festivals all over the world.
Links:
https://musicfromnoone.bandcamp.com/
https://vimeo.com/swoon
Marc follows Moving Poems’ own Marie Craven, who judged the contest last year. (Here are the results.) Marc wrote about his philosophy on judging poetry film contests after his experience on the ZEBRA jury in 2016.
Refugee Blues by W. H. Auden
This 2016 film co-directed by Stephan Bookas and Tristan Dawes moved me to tears. That’s how effective, and affecting, I found this juxtaposition of W. H. Auden’s poem (text here) about Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany—read by a man identified only as Noah, a refugee and former child soldier from Uganda—with excellent documentary footage of contemporary refugees. Here’s the official synopsis from Bookas’ website:
Set to the verses of W.H. Auden’s 1939 poem, the multi-award winning “Refugee Blues” charts a day in ‘the jungle’, the refugee camp outside Calais. More intimate and unlike much of what has been seen in the mass media, this documentary poem counterpoints the camp’s harsh reality of frequent clashes with the French riot police with its inhabitants’ longing for a better future.
On Vimeo, Bookas includes a mini essay about the making of the film, which I found illuminating in its suggestion of how documentary poetry can differ from journalism. This was something I’d been thinking about because I recently attended a reading and slideshow from another documentary poetry project, which was a collaboration between a poet and a photojournalist: Julia Spicher Kasdorf and Steven Rubin’s Shale Play: Poems and Photographs from the Fracking Fields. Technically, Auden’s poem by itself would not be considered an example of documentary poetry, but as a filmpoem Refugee Blues certainly would qualify, in my opinion. Anyway, I hope Mr. Bookas won’t mind my quoting a sizable chunk of his post:
We didn’t set out to make a film at first – that idea came later – we just packed a car full of blankets, clothes, food and other items and went, not fully knowing what to expect. But of course, being filmmakers, we also brought along our cameras – to see if we might have the opportunity to document, to capture, to find the human story in all the chaos that was so ubiquitous in the media at the time.
Soon after our arrival, we found the people living at the refugee camp to be very warm and welcoming, as long as we assured them we weren’t news-gathering journalists.
We didn’t film anything to begin with and just walked around, introduced ourselves as documentary filmmakers and listened to people and their stories. Every single one of them was unique and heartbreaking.
Following these discussions, we asked if it would be alright to take out our cameras and start filming. For the most part the answer was a resounding yes.
We spent the following days exploring the camp and talking to people, discussing the situation and the political climate and spending time with them, being invited for coffee and food and allowed to film elements of their daily lives. This turned out to be the calm before the storm, as things culminated in a clash between the camp’s inhabitants and the French riot police on the road leading to the ferry terminal, symbolic for the plight of the refugees and their struggle against institutional powers they are unable to defend themselves against. […]
Of course, our film can’t possibly even begin to try and unravel all the lives and personal fates entangled within this crisis. But in some small way, and for us especially, it has given this tragedy a face that’s less abstract, more relatable, more human.
Film festival news: Art Visuals & Poetry program; calls for work from Carmethan Bay, At the Fringe
In last week’s round-up I gave the Art Visuals & Poetry Film Festival too brief a mention since I hadn’t found much in English. But I just got a bilingual press release from organizer Sigrun Höllrigl, so I can rectify that. Here’s the English portion of her email. Note that the link at the end also goes to an English-language schedule of events.
FOCUS USA / International film guests
The Art Visuals & Poetry Film Festival will take place for the fifth time from November 29 to December 1, 2019 at the METRO Kinokulturhaus in Vienna. In addition to four competition programmes, Poetry Live and film talks with international guests, numerous curated film programmes will be shown. This year’s focus is on poetry films from the USA. Founded in 2013 by Sigrun Höllrigl, the Poetry Film Festival has grown steadily since its beginnings and, with 101 film screenings on three days it is currently the second largest poetry film festival world-wide. In addition to Todd Boss (Motionpoems USA), film guests from Dubai, Belgium, Germany and Ireland have announced their arrival and are expected to attend. Including the domestic film scene, 40 contributing artists will join the festival.
FILM COMPETITIONS AND AUDIENCE AWARD
In 2019, two international competitions were announced and 170 films submitted, 63 art works came from Austria. The festival will award cash prizes to 4 films: The Main Jury Prize and Special Award (poem by Sophie Reyer) will be awarded on the recommendation of the jury. The Hubert Sielecki Prize goes to an Austrian poetry film of his choice. This year, for the first time, the Audience Prize will be awarded among international films. Have a look at the festival and vote for the winner on Saturday night! Festival tickets can be ordered via the ticket service of the Metro Kinokulturhaus. Phone +43 1 512 18 03 daily from 14:00–21:00 or via reservierung@filmarchiv.at
Find the festival programme online https://www.poetryfilm-vienna.com/en/timetable/2019
We are looking forward to welcoming you at the festival!
* * *
My co-editor Marie Craven is currently on the road (for the poetry film cause) but alerted me to two new-to-me festivals that are still open for submissions:
Carmarthen Bay Film Festival
This Welsh festival includes a POETIC CINEMA section for the first time this year:
Poetry film is a subgenre of film that fuses the use of spoken word poetry, visual images, and sound to create a stronger presentation and interpretation of the meaning being conveyed. This fusion of image and spoken word (both independent and interdependent) creates what William Wees called the “Poetry-film” genre.
We are looking for Submissions that:
• Are based upon an interesting concept;
• Are innovative;
• Are well crafted; and
• Create an emotional resonance
The sidebar category dropdown elaborates:
Poets, filmmakers, and media artists are called to submit their work to this brand new category. We will accept submissions of poetry films, filmpoems, digital-poetry, poetry video, Cin(E)-Poetry, spoken word films, videopoema, visual poetry, poetrinca, media poetry, and all films that are visually driven by text. Eligible submissions must have a maximum length of 40 minutes. CBFF cannot be held liable or responsible for any claim involving copyright, trademark, credits, or royalty infringement.Entries that are not in English must be subtitled in English.
Unfortunately, it’s rather pricey to enter—currently USD $45—so I kind of doubt that they’ll get many submissions from the more avant-garde sub-genres they include in their list. This strikes me as a bunch of film industry types wanting to add a bit of experimental cachet to their program, while not actually welcoming scruffier poets and auteurs. Interesting as a possible sign of the times, though.
AT THE FRINGE International Arts Festival
AT THE FRINGE International Arts Festival will take place in Tranås (Sweden) from 27th June to 4th July 2020.
The film section of the festival is focused on screening experimental films and videopoems from all over the world and we are happy to open the new call for films!
Submit your film in one of these three sections: […]
GEMS – OPEN CALL FOR VIDEOPOEMS
A collection of precious stones. We are looking for videopoems, those films that stand on the border between audiovisual languages and words – written or performed. The festival is open to national and international filmmakers. Any film with no limitation of theme or duration is welcome to apply.
[…]
The videopoems submitted must have a duration of maximum 30 minutes (opening and ending credits included). They must include subtitles in English or Swedish (where the original language is not one of these two). There is no limitation for the number of works that each author can submit.
It’s great to see something like this in Sweden. And this time, the entry fee is more affordable: USD $10. The deadline is 31 March.
Poetry film festival news round-up
Poetry film festival season is now in full swing. Major festivals are just ’round the corner in Vienna, Berlin, Mexico City, and Athens.
First up is the biannual Art Visuals & Poetry Film Festival scheduled for 29 November to 1 December in Vienna. Though mainly a German-language event, this year it includes a special focus on the US-based production company Motionpoems.
Then it’s time for the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival in Berlin, whose full programme is now online. They sent along a press release, worth reproducing nearly in full due the central importance of this festival to the poetry film genre.
Once again, Berlin becomes the centre for the poetry film. From 5 to 8 December, the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival will for the 10th time be presenting the poetry film in all its facets in the Kino in der KulturBrauerei cinema. For the first time the current poetry film from Germany is the centre piece of the festival. Poetry film creation in the United Kingdom will be given a special spot in the limelight. The programme is now online. And Tickets go on advance sale in mid-November.
FESTIVAL OPENING
THU 5 Dec | 20.00 | Kino in der KulturBrauereiGuest of honour will be Jochen Kuhn, artist and film maker. A voice of contemporary German poetry, Özlem Özgül Dündar, is reading her latest poems. The music of the British and Berlin based multi-instrumentalist Rowan Coupland is often referring to poetry.
GERMANY-WIDE COMPETITION
Part 1: Yearned-For Places FRI 6 Dec | 19.30 (Repetition SAT 7 Dec | 14.30)
Part 2: Common Values SAT 7 Dec | 19.30. (Repetition SUN 8 Dec | 14.30)
all in Kino in der KulturBrauereiFrom more than 500 submissions from all over Germany the Programme Commission has chosen the best poetry films for the Competition. The international Jury of three will be awarding the prizes to the winning films at the awards ceremony on 8 December.
AWARD CEREMONY
SUN 8 Dec | 20.00 | Kino in der KulturBrauereiThe international Jury, comprising Jana Cernik (AG Kurzfilm), Charlotte Warsen (poet) and Tim Webb (filmmaker), will be awarding four prizes: the ZEBRA Prize for the Best Poetry Film, donated by the Haus für Poesie, the Goethe Film Prize, donated by the Goethe Institute, the Prize for the Best Film for Tolerance, donated by the German Foreign Ministry and the Ritter Sport Film Prize, donated by Alfred Ritter GmbH & Co. KG. Musical accompaniment for the evening will be provided by F.S. Blumm.
FOCUS UK
We Are Poets FRI. 6.12. | 5 pm
Very British FRI. 6.12. | 10 pm
State of the Art SAT. 7.12. | 5 pm
Stiff Upper Verse SAT. 7.12. | 10 pm
all in Kino in der KulturBrauereiThe country focus this year is on the United Kingdom. The programme ‘State of the Art’ shows the latest British productions, curated by the poets and film makers Chaucer Cameron, Helen Dewbery, Lucy English and Sarah Tremlett. The ‘Very British’ programme is a Best Of from the past few decades of the British poetry film. The documentary ‘We Are Poets’ by Daniel Lucchesi and Alex Ramseyer-Bache celebrates its German première at the festival. In ‘Stiff Upper Verse’ the British poets Simon Barraclough, Lucy English and Roseanne Watt will be reading in English, Welsh and the dialect of the Shetland Isles.
PRISM
Journey in the Mind FRI 6 Dec | 19.30
Transit SAT 7 Dec | 17.00
Parlour Games SAT 7 Dec | 19.30
Interrelations SAT 7 Dec | 22.00 | all in Kino in der KulturBrauereiThe Programme Commission has selected 35 films for Prism; three programmes present the broad spectrum of the German poetry film including animations, experimental films and features. The programme ‘Transit’ shows documentary portraits of poets.
NEW TALENTS
design akademie berlin & Hochschule Anhalt, Dessau FRI 6 Dec | 17.00
UdK Berlin & KHM Köln FRI 6 Dec | 22.00
HFBK Hamburg & Hochschule Düsseldorf SAT 7 Dec | 14.30
HFK Bremen & Hochschule Mainz SAT 7 Dec | 22.00
Bauhaus-Uni Weimar & HBK Braunschweig SUN 8 Dec | 16.00
all in Kino in der KulturBrauereiColloquium: The Eye of the Poem SUN 8 Dec | 11.00 | Haus für Poesie
Master Class: Between Film and Poetry FRI 6 Dec | 14.00 | Haus für PoesieThe poetry film is a popular genre at universities and film academies. Students at ten German higher education institutions will be showing poetry films made in the course of a collaboration over a year. In the Colloquium Anna Anders (UdK Berlin), Sophie Maintigneux (KHM Cologne), Ulrike Almut Sandig (poet), Tim Webb (Royal College of Art) and Sarah Tremlett (Liberated Words CIC) will be discussing the position of the poetry film in German and British higher education institutions. And the director Jochen Kuhn will be giving a poetry film master class.
FESTIVAL POEM: [native vegetation a natural resource]
SUN 8 Dec | 17.00 | Kino in der KulturBrauereiIn response to ZEBRA’s call for entries, film makers have submitted their film versions of this year’s festival poem, [dieses regionale getreide] ([native vegetation a natural resource]) by Daniel Falb. Film makers Zihrong Lu, Gruppe Leuchtstoff, Holger Mohaupt and Gabriele Nugara will present their film versions and be talking to the poet about poetry and film. You can read the poem on lyrikline.org.
WORD PICTURES – A ZEBRA NIGHT OF READINGS
FRI 6 Dec | 22.00 | Kino in der KulturBrauereiPoems by Özlem Özgül Dündar, Adrian Kasnitz, Ulrike Almut Sandig, Kathrin Schmidt and Raed Wahesh are the basis of this year’s films in the Competition and Prism. In the ZEBRA Night of Readings the poets will be reading their texts and talking to Alexander Gumz about making films based on poems.
PROGRAMM FOR CHILDREN AND YOUNG POEPLE
Media Workshop: The Spirits We Conjured up
WED 4 Dec | 9.00 | Haus für Poesie
Sorcerer’s Apprentices in the Moor of Horror: Programme of Ballads
THU 5 Dec | 9.00 | Kino in der KulturBrauerei
Holes in the Head: Programme in Focus Language English
THU 5 Dec | 9.30 | Kino in der KulturBrauerei
I Made It Myself: Films by Children for Children
FRI 6 Dec | 9.00 | Kino in der KulturBrauerei
ZEBRINO Competition FRI 6 Dec | 9.00 | Kino in der KulturBrauerei
Poetry Workshop Writing Netflix! FRI 6 Dec | 9.00 | Haus für Poesie
Workshop Slam: Rucksack and a Journey FRI 6 Dec | 9.00 | Herder-GymnasiumThe Best Poetry Film for Children and Young People will be chosen by the young audience themselves in the ZEBRINO Competition. There will also be a colourful programme of workshops and films for Berlin schoolchildren with, among others, the Spoken Word artists Bas Böttcher and Nicole May.
As great as it is to see ZEBRA continuing to flourish, now to the point of becoming an annual festival, I’m equally excited to see a new poetry film festival springing up — in Mexico City. Check out FESTIVAL FOTOGENIA, I missed the call-out (sorry) but thanks to social media posts by filmmaker Helmie Stil, this didn’t escape my radar altogether. The description on their website suggests an avant-garde perspective on the genre:
FOTOGENIA, FIRST INTERNATIONAL FILM POETRY & DIVERGENT NARRATIVES FESTIVAL promotes a space with alternative conception of films, a celebration of experimentation and avant-garde framework, the love of curiosity and research of the seventh Art. Everyone is invited, taking into consideration the disruptive nature of the selected works.
We welcome you to watch films in another way!
If you are an audiovisual maker interested in provoking the cinematographic image through the exploration of the frontiers and limits of film narrative, genre, format and the nature of film itself, in order to converse with the viewers in innovative and critical ways to ignite a confrontation between reality and cinematic phenomenon, this is your place to exhibit your passion.
![The +Institute [for Experimental Arts] and Void Network present the 8th International Video Poetry Festival 2019](https://i0.wp.com/movingpoems.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Athans-video-poetry-2019-call-out-1024x630-640x394.jpg?resize=640%2C394)
Meanwhile in Athens, the International Video Poetry Festival will be held on the weekend of the 14th and 15th. (But submissions remain open until November 20!) Special events this year will include a screening of videopoems by my co-editor Marie Cravens as well as the touring program of videopoems from around the world that she’s pulled together, Poetry + Video, plus the Margaret Tait 100 program celebrating the first Scottish woman to make feature films, who was also a pioneer of poetry in film. And there will be a videopoetry seminar panel including film-makers, writers, performers, and musicians.
Finally, I’d be remiss if I didn’t include a reminder that submissions are still open for REELpoetry/Houston TX 2020 (Deadline: December 9) and the 2020 Newlyn PZ International Film Festival (Deadline: February 24) .
Call for entries: 2020 Weimar Poetry Film Prize
As of November 1, the fifth annual Weimar Poetry Film Prize is open for submissions. And this time, it has its own festival.
Through the new film award, the Literary Society of Thuringia and the study field Multimedia narration of the Bauhaus University are looking for innovative poetry films. Filmmakers from any nation and of any age are welcome to participate with up to three short films of up to 10:00 mins, which should explore the relation between film and written poetry in an innovative, straightforward way. Films that are produced before 2017 will not be considered.
From all submitted films selected for the festival competition three Jury members will choose the winner of the main prize (1000 € Best Animation, 1000,- € Best Video). Moreover, an audience award of 250 € will be awarded.
In 2020, the Weimar Poetry Film Prize will be awarded for the first time as part of its own festival – the International Poetry Film Festival of Thuringia – which will take place from May to July 2020 in several cities in Thuringia. The core program (with the award ceremony) takes place from June 12th–14th in Weimar.
The competition »Weimar Poetry Film Award« is financed by Kulturstiftung des Freistaats Thüringen and the City of Weimar.
Deadline: March 31st, 2020
The Form for submissions [pdf] by e-mail to info[at]poetryfilm.de is coming soon.
The »Weimar Poetry Film Award« call for entries is international. For the submission please send with the other informations a quotable text of the related poem in German or English.
Presentation of awards: June 13th, 2020 at the Lichthaus cinema Weimar.
the new therapist specializes in trauma counseling by Claudia Rankine
This has got to be one of the best student animations I’ve ever seen. Jake Mansbridge animates a poem from American poet Claudia Rankine‘s Forward Prize-winning collection Citizen: An American Lyric as part of an exciting new initiative from the Forward Arts Foundation, which sponsors both the Forward Prizes and UK’s National Poetry Day. Here’s how their director, Susannah Herbert, described it in an email:
National Poetry Day UK, which falls on the first Thursday in October, is about to celebrate its 25th anniversary. Effectively, this is a huge mass participation cultural festival that gives everyone in the nation an excuse to share a favourite poem, or line of poetry – through readings, displays, performances and, increasingly, through social media. The theme this year is Truth.
A friend who ran the MA course in Animation at the University of Hertfordshire invited us to give her students a “brief” that they could work to as part of their degree course. We gave them 100 Prized Poems, an anthology of poems drawn from the shortlists of the Forward Prizes over the years… plus a few other poems, all loosely connected to the theme of Truth, and suggested they each create an animation that would bring the poems they chose – and National Poetry Day – to new audiences.
This stunning Jake Mansbridge animation of a poem from Claudia Rankine’s Citizen is just one of the films that came out of the process… and the best are being shown next month at London’s Southbank Centre.
That 20 October screening at the Southbank Centre is part of a six-day festival, Poetry International. If you can’t make the screening, all of the videos are being uploaded to a playlist on the National Poetry Day YouTube channel.
Rankine is no stranger to poetry film. She collaborated with her husband, filmmaker John Lucas, on a series of video essays, a few of which I’ve shared here, and Citizen included both stills and transcripts from those videos. So I was happy when Citizen became so celebrated and widely read on both sides of the Atlantic. It’s also one of those books that every clueless white person should read.
I thought I had a very nice time by Liz Waldner
Liz Waldner voices her poem in this newly uploaded video from Denise Newman. Newman, whose experimental work I’ve shared here twice before after encountering it randomly on Vimeo, is a published poet, translator, and multimedia artist who teaches at the California College of the Arts. Liz Waldner is an even more widely published poet with many honors and awards to her name. According to the Poetry Foundation,
Waldner’s work is known for its formal experimentation, reliance on quotation and pastiche, and often playful rhyme schemes. Using long titles, made-up words, and expansive proselike sentences that change topic quickly and constantly, Waldner’s verse, according to poet-critic Stephen Burt, “pays constant homage to the delights of the senses; beside her, most similarly difficult present-day poets seem arid, theoretical, no fun.”
Newman told me in an email that they made I thought I had a very nice time five years ago, and are collaborating on a second video now, which is what prompted her to dig out and share their earlier piece.
Call for work: REELpoetry/Houston TX 2020
I apologize for not sharing this back on August 15, the opening date, but videopoets and poetry filmmakers still have until December 9 to submit work for this Texas-based festival, now in its second year.
REELpoetry/Houston TX 2020 is an international poetry film festival screening cinepoetry, documentaries, performance video, plus panels, workshops & more JANUARY 24-26, 2020.
For complete guidelines and submissions:
Our first international poetry film festival took place March 22-24, 2019. You can read all about it HERE
It’s especially embarrassing that I forgot to share this earlier since I’ve agreed to be the judge. It’s a very exciting-sounding event, which filmmaker Pam Falkenberg attended last year and reviewed in these very virtual pages. She noted that “REELpoetry advocates a big-tent approach, preferring an expansive canon rather than a narrow one.” This year again
The Festival will also include workshops, live performances, talks, panel discussions, Q&A with poets and filmmakers. Come to meet international, national and local poets, film makers and artists, network and socialize, see and be seen. All screenings are centrally located and special hotel arrangements will be offered.
NOTE: Submissions in a language other than English must have an English translation of the poetry either presented in the film or as a written handout.
Awards & Prizes
Judges Award $225 Cinepoetry
Audience Award $225 CinepoetryJudges Award $225 Poetry Short Documentary
Audience Award $225 Poetry Short DocumentaryAudience Award $100 – Best Performance
Rules & Terms
REELpoetry 2020 is accepting film and video in three categories: (1) cinepoems (2) short poetry documentaries (3) spoken word videos. You are allowed up to 3 entries in each of the categories, each submitted separately, as follows:.
CINEPOEMS – 5 minutes max
Created by poets or filmmakers or artist collaborations.SHORT POETRY DOCUMENTARIES – 15 minutes max
May document the making of a poem, daily life of a poet, poetry event etc.All cinepoems and documentaries must include closing credits on the screen, and provide up to 3 stills max. You will also need to provide a short (75 word max) statement and brief bio for both the poet and filmmaker( (60 word max))
SPOKEN WORD VIDEO – 3 minutes max
Video of live performance, slam
NOTE: Attendance required. At the Festival you will perform live with your video in the background with the sound turned off.All submissions in a language other than English must have an English translation of the poetry either presented in the film or as a written handout.
By submitting to REELpoetry/Houston TX you acknowledge that work is yours, and that you have obtained permission(s) where required. You also agree to allow your work to be included in a curated series that will travel nationally and internationally.
NOTE: Public Poetry Members receive a 20% discount on the entry fee. Memberships start at $8/mo.
To join Public Poetry as a member go to: http://www.publicpoetry.net/membership-here/
Call for work: Visible Poetry Project 2020
Filmmaker applications and poetry submissions are open now through October 31 for the 2020 series of the Visible Poetry Project. As Marie noted just now in a post to the main site, VPP has been going since 2017, producing and publishing at least a video a day throughout the month of April. There’s also an off-line component to the project, with screenings in New York City and beyond. And in the first three years of its existence, more and more prominent poets and filmmakers have taken part, though as they say on the poetry submissions page, they “strive to emphasize the diversity of the global poetry community, and so encourage you to submit regardless of background or circumstance. Whether poetry is your hobby, profession, private outlet, or public expression, your work is welcome.” A similar statement occurs at the head of the filmmaker guidelines:
The Visible Poetry Project strives to emphasize the diversity of the global film community, and so encourage you to apply regardless of background or circumstance. Whether filmmaking is your hobby, profession, private outlet, or public expression, your work is welcome.
Within your application, please provide a reel and/or links to previous films you’ve created. All work samples must be original, and you must be one of the main contributors. You may submit up to three links. We recommend submitting samples that you believe to be representative of the greater styles and themes in your work. If you are accepted, this will help inform which poet you may get paired with.
You may apply as part of a team (up to two filmmakers). If you are applying as part of a team, please submit only one application. Please include links to reels for both collaborators, and send an email to visiblepoetryproject@gmail.com, CC’ing your co-director.
If you are a producer, director of photography, or editor, and are interested in being involved in the 2020 series, please email visiblepoetryproject@gmail.com.
Click through to apply. Or, if you write poetry, submit here.
