~ Animation ~
navn nome name by OTTARAS
Sound poetry and concrete poetry elude most efforts at translation — except for translation into videopoetry, as in this new release from OTTARAS (Ottar Ormstad and Taras Mashtalir) and Alexander Vojjov. I’m sure knowing Norwegian would add layers of meaning but even without that, I found the visualization of names as planetary objects or one-celled organisms intriguing and delightful. Here’s the Vimeo description:
NAVN NOME NAME (2016) is based on Ottar Ormstad’s “telefonkatalogdiktet” (‘the phonebook poem’). It is his third book of concrete poetry, published in Norway by Samlaget (2006). For this language research project, Ormstad read (!) the phonebook of Oslo 2004 and selected names on a poetic basis. In the book, the names are presented visually as concrete poetry. Most of the names are strongly connected to Norwegian and describe phenomena in nature.
NAVN NOME NAME is the second work of a collection of video poems created by the Norwegian-Russian duo OTTARAS (Ottar Ormstad and Taras Mashtalir) in collaboration with Russian video artist Alexander Vojjov. In the video, Ormstad reads names selected by the Russian-American composer Mashtalir. Through this work, Norwegian language turns into international sound poetry. Ormstad’s collection of family names present in Oslo’s phonebook at the time of reading are exposed and read by the author while performing to Mashtalir’s pulsating music. Is everyone connected to each other in the sphere that is shaping before the viewer’s eyes? How do names and language relate to the atmospheric scapes Vojjov creates of numbers, geometric forms and abstract shapes?
NAVN NOME NAME exists in different versions made for screening and live performance. Raising awareness of electronic poetry and sonic ecology, attracting new audience to a potent yet to come genre is the inspiration for this collaboration.
The video is produced in HD 16:9 in color, stereo.
Duration: 06:05 mins
Animation: Alexander Vojjov
Music: Taras Mashtalir
Concrete poetry, voice & production: Ottar Ormstad
© Ottar Ormstad 2016
Hammersmith by Sean O’Brien (excerpts)
This new poetry film by UK filmmaker Kate Sweeney, based on a poem by Sean O’Brien, was commissioned by the 2016 Newcastle Poetry Festival. The Vimeo description reads:
In response to extracts from Sean O’ Brien’s same-titled poem, ‘Hammersmith’ is an elegiac, hand-drawn animation sweeping through 1950’s London. drawn from the iconic cinematography from Jules Dessin’s 1950 noir film, ‘Night And The City’.
The soundtrack by Lady Caroline Mary includes a song by Bernadette Sweeney.
The Art of Poetry Film with Cheryl Gross: “Beer”
BEER
direction: Nerdo
poem: Charles Bukowski
art direction: Daniele Gavatorta
coordination: Diego Pizziconi
animation: Daniele Gavatorta, Simone Cirillo, Milena Tipaldo, Erik Righetti, and Alessandro Durando
original music and sound design: Enrico Ascoli
voiceover: David Wayne Callahan
recording engineer: Andrea Pestarino
2016
I acquired a taste for beer many years ago while at an artist residency program in Saarbrücken, Germany. I attribute this phenomenon to my good friend and installation artist, Claudia Brieske. Upon meeting the poet Nicelle Davis, I was introduced to the world of video poetry. In my opinion the two go hand-in-hand. So it’s no wonder why Beer based on a poem by the famous Charles Bukowski caught my eye. I’m a big fan of Bukowski, so to find a video poem that embraces not one but two things I am passionate about is a rare treat. In simpler terms, it’s worth the price of admission.
That being said, my favorite place to start is always with the visuals. I love fast-paced, well-designed art. The animation is smooth and lyrical. It conveys a feeling of nostalgia in a postmodern sort of way, meaning the vector images are all computer-generated, but they contain images of objects such as a telephone that were a part of life back in the 20th century. All have either disappeared already or are about to disappear.
As far as the writing is concerned, I think most of us can relate. Break-ups with women, waiting for the phone to ring, just adds to the bloat of this self-imposed condition, hobby or should I say pastime of beer drinking. But when it comes down to it, life is just a matter of waiting for the next thing, waiting for something that will get us closer to the brass ring. In the meantime we have beer, the vehicle that will help ease the frustration and pass the time.
Bølgeslag / Waves: three poems by Tor Ulven
This may be my favorite Kristian P./Gasspedal animated poetry film yet. It was just released from password protection on Vimeo a week ago after a three-year tour of film festivals. It premiered at the Norwegian publishing house Gyldendal in 2013 on what would have been Tor Ulven’s 60th birthday. Here’s the description from Vimeo (italics mine):
Everything disappears. Recordings of our voices will become archeological remains, and a spinning record yields fossil waves. Waves is based on three poems by Tor Ulven.
—
Tor Ulven (1953–1995):
Ulven made his debut as a poet in 1977, with the poetry collection Skyggen av urfuglen (Shadows of the Primordial Bird). Today, Ulven’s works enjoy an iconic status, and his poetry and prose have been translated into English, German, Spanish, Arabic, Hindi, Russian and other languages.
—
Words & voice by Tor Ulven
Design & animation by Kristian P.
Produced by Audun Lindholm & Harald Fougner
—
Based on three poems from Ulven’s poetry collection Forsvinningspunkt (Vanishing Point), Gyldendal Norsk Forlag, 1981.
The Art of Poetry Film with Cheryl Gross: “The Clinic”
The Clinic (Kliniken)
poem and voiceover: Annelie Axén
design and animation: Kristian Pedersen
produced by Gasspedal Animert
2010
One of my least favorite activities when I was a child was visiting the dentist. It was a major cause of anxiety. However, there is something about The Clinic that addresses this discomfort in a unique and bizarre way.
Despite my deep love for nostalgia and the fact that I lean left-of-center concerning my taste in entertainment, The Clinic kicked up memories that were not pleasant. Reminiscing about the dentist is not exactly what I call a good time and the sound of drilling puts me over the edge. Despite my discomfort, there is no doubt that it’s a great video. The visuals are clever and fit right in. I am particularly fond of the teeth x-rays, the distressed film look and the brilliant use of typography and Adobe After Effects.
The Clinic uses teeth as a metaphor. From the beginning, we are made to feel as if we are about to encounter impending doom and are made to feel nervous. We are coldly asked questions that feed into our fears and anxiety. There is no comfort offered, just more questions. Eventually it is revealed that we are just a number. As the toothless grind their jaws, perhaps the antidote to the uneasiness we feel is the white powder with our information on it.
The Clinic in my opinion is a very successful, Orwellian piece. Not only does it get the message across, but it creeps me out. Seeing the work is feeling it and again, and at the end of the day this is what matters most. It’s traditionally been said that great art should evoke powerful emotions, and by that standard, The Clinic certainly qualifies as great art.
‘n Gewone blou Maandagoggend / An Ordinary Blue Monday by Ronelda Kamfer
Naomi van Niekerk‘s animation of a poem by Ronelda Kamfer. Like the Grand Prize winner What about the law, this was on the shortlist for the 2016 Weimar Poetry Film Awards. Both films were produced as part of a series of animated poetry shorts in Afrikaans called Filmverse, headed up by Diek Grobler under the aegis of the ATKV (Afrikaans Language and Culture Association). Here’s how Google Translate renders the website’s description of the project:
Classical poetry and the work of contemporary poets are used to create a “visual anthology” in which a dialogue is created between word and image. Each animation film is accompanied by its own soundtrack in which the poem is read among others. The end product is a DVD of about 30 minutes with the twelve animation films on which are displayed as a separate production. The DVD playback is accompanied by an exhibition of posters of each of the twelve animation films.
What abou’ de lô (What about the law) by Adam Small
This animation by Charles Badenhorst of a poem in Afrikaans by Adam Small is the Grand Prize winner of the first Weimar Poetry Film Awards.
Die Jury des 1. Weimarer Poetryfilm-Preises, bestehend aus der Erfurter Dichterin Nancy Hünger, dem Leiter des ZEBRA Poetryfilm-Festivals (Berlin/Münster) Thomas Zandegiacomo Del Bel sowie dem Wiener Filmemacher Hubert Sielecki wählte den südafrikanischen Beitrag WHAT ABOUT THE LAW (2014, 3:14 min) zum Sieger des mit 1000,- € dotierten Jurypreises. Regie führte der südafrikanische Animationskünstler Charles Badenhorst; das dem Film zugrundeliegende Gedicht verfasste der südafrikanische Autor Adam Small.
The Audience Award went to Steel and Air, a film based on a poem by John Ashbery directed by Chris and Nick Libbey and commissioned by Motionpoems, which I shared back in March. The full list of nominees is on the Poetryfilmkanal website.
The Poster Reads by Nicelle Davis
The latest poetry animation by artist (and Moving Poems Magazine columnist) Cheryl Gross illustrates a poem by her long-time collaborator Nicelle Davis. Additional credits include “Voice: Robert Fisher, Music: David Michael Curry, Performed by: Willard Grant Conspiracy.” Cheryl’s succinct description is also worth quoting:
This video poem tells of the emotional impact that terrorist drills, conducted by police, have on a non affluent community.
A powerful, affecting poem. I like how the viewer/listener gradually comes to understand that what originally seemed like surrealist hyperbole is in fact all too real — though Cheryl’s drawings keep our attention focused on just how wrong and bizarre it is.
Intertwined by Eleni Cay
https://youtu.be/42gKkAtVwHQ
Both poem and concept are credited to the Slovakian poet Eleni Cay; animation and score are the work of beyon wren moor of the ecofeminist film and theater production company LoveHoldLetGo (which has apparently let go of its former domain, loveholdletgo.com). The YouTube description also notes that “Intertwined was shortlisted for the Elbow Room Prize 2015 and for the Ó Bhéal International Poetry-Film Competition 2015.”
Shop by Lucy English
The latest addition to UK poet (and Liberated Words festival co-creator) Lucy English’s Book of Hours project comes from the U.S. artist (and Moving Poems Magazine columnist) Cheryl Gross. Her usual “Dr. Seuss on crack” approach to animation makes a great fit for the poem’s wry take on motherhood, I thought.
Incidentally, I believe that the call for filmmakers to contribute to the project is still open, if anyone’s interested.
The Washington Post sponsors ten poetry animations for National Poetry Month
Wednesday’s Washington Post online published ten brief but innovative animations of portions of poems by contemporary U.S. poets. The feature, authored by Phoebe Connelly, Suzette Moyer, Julio Negron, Amy King, Emily Chow, and Ron Charles, has a headline complete with line breaks:
To celebrate
the 20th anniversary of
National Poetry Month
We asked
10 poets for
poems.
10 designers
put them
in motion.
Sadly, there’s no accompanying text to give readers any indication that poetry animation might be a thing that other people have done before — a missed opportunity to, for example, link to Motionpoems, who have been matching up prominent U.S. poets with top animators and directors for years. (Though to be fair, Motionpoems too has sometimes acted as if it’s the only organization doing this.) In another indication of the newspaper’s scarcity mentality, they made the unfortunate choice to host the videos themselves, streaming them from the Amazon cloud, which translates to poor performance at my slow DSL speed, and probably for plenty of others in flyover country as well. And anyone who isn’t a paid subscriber may be blocked if they’ve already used up their monthly quota of articles. Fortunately, the Post has also uploaded the videos to AOL.On and Dailymotion, and a couple of the animators have posted their work to Vimeo, so let me share those versions as a public service, in the order in which they appear in the article. (The one thing that’s missing here is the text of the poems, which is useful to see how the excerpts used in the animations relate to the larger works. For that, you’ll still need to visit the Post‘s website.)
Kevin Young + Art&Graft: ‘Commencement’
Edward Hirsch + Ellen Porteus: ‘Cotton Candy’
Mary Karr + Charlie Brand: ‘Face Down’
Dunya Mikhail + Hannah Jacobs: ‘A Second Life’
Nick Flynn + James Price: ‘Harbor’
John Yau + Bran Dougherty-Johnson: ‘Portrait’
Patricia Lockwood + Paul Cooper: ‘The Hornet Mascot Falls in Love’
Michael Robbins + Rafael Verona: ‘Not Fade Away’
Tracy K. Smith + Muti: ‘Visitation’
Can’t be embedded — Watch on AOL.
Victoria Chang + Phil Borst: ‘The Boss Calls Us at Home’
Can’t be embedded — Watch on AOL.
