~ Author-made videopoems ~

Whore in the Eddy by Heather Haley

A new videopoem by Heather Haley, and her first produced in full collaboration with her son, Lucas Raycevick, as editor. Here’s the description at Vimeo:

Fierce, full of stiletto irony, verve–yet rife with sensitivity–“Whore In The Eddy’ explores a winding road of twisted fates. “There but for the grace of God go I.” Two women, one forsaken, the other spared. Two tales told though images of a lush, denuded forest littered with fallen giants, cut short like the lives of so many women.

Heather also blogged about the making of the film in some detail. An excerpt:

I tried to find found footage but matching it with ours didn’t work as my 17-year old son/editor pointed out. He’s been helping me on videopoems since age eight, but this is our first real collaboration, a challenge in and of itself but mostly highly gratifying. He kicks my butt! Will not allow shots that are too shaky or out of focus. So funny. I said, hey, I’m not trying to be Steven Spielberg. I will make choices you wouldn’t. We argue for a bit and he wins. ‘Cause he’s right. We have standards. That’s my boy. He amazes me; taught himself to edit video at age ten, began producing machinimas and has had his own YouTube channel since. He’s got a lovely podcasting set-up going too which he allows me to use sometimes. We’ve developed a system in the house so he remains undisturbed while recording. He places a funky beaded necklace—a souvenir of Hawaii—on the door handle. I’m so lucky, he’s a great kid and he works cheap; the third major challenge, a zero budget. (I’ve spent fifty bucks on a dress and seven bucks on flowers.) We barter. I copy edit his fan fiction in return for video editing services.

eloise by Al Rempel

British Columbia-based poet Al Rempel made this film with post-production help from Steph St. Laurent of VideoNexus Productions. The text is from Remple’s collection understories.

A heavy hand in the black sky by Martha McCollough

Another animation from Martha McCollough‘s erasure project Grey Vacation.

A Border History by Forrest Gander

Poem, music and film are all by Forrest Gander.

coração (heart) by Marcelo Sahea

Brazilian poet, performer, and visual and sound artist Marcelo Sahea produced the text, did the reading and made the film with the help of some crowd-sourced footage:

During two months, some friends and interested people were invited to participate sending short clips of its naked bodies filmed by themselves with any types of cameras. Some of these images are part of the work that you will see.

when you land in New Orleans by Ben Pelhan

Ben Pelhan shot, wrote, edited, supplied the voice, etc. Pelhan is a Pittsburgh native currently living in New Orleans. “When he’s not playing poet he plays with whatever video equipment he can get his hands on,” according to a recent bio at smoking glue gun.

innocent beat by Martha McCollough

An interesting kinetic-text animation by Martha McCollough, a painter and animator from Boston, who notes in the description that it it is “Based on a page from my erasure project Grey Vacation. The wrongest thing ever said.”

Fireflies by Raymond Luczak

Raymond Luczak signs a poem from his newly re-issued book This Way to the Acorns, which sounds great: a collection of nature poems based on memories of his childhood in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. The music is by John Stutte.

No Hurry to Find Out by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer has been making and posting poetry videos to her Ryezome channel on YouTube for about a year now, and like so many video-inclined poets, hadn’t been aware of the richness of the videopoetry tradition, as she confessed in an email: “I had no idea there were so many of them out there. It was as if I thought I had invented them!” But working in isolation did lead her to forge a unique approach, especially in regards to the soundtrack.

For more of her poetry, check out her daily poetry practice at A Hundred Falling Veils.

Letter in Response to a Friend’s Suicide Note by Holly Karapetkova

http://vimeo.com/39721815

An affecting and allusive videopoem by poet and children’s author Holly Karapetkova. The text originally appeared in The Ledge.

Over Breakfast by R.W. Perkins

http://vimeo.com/38961911

R. W. Perkins‘ latest videopoem. He says on his blog:

Artistically it is an attempt to stretch myself in the realm of videopoetry, by trying something that has proved to be difficult to do in this art form, “being literal”.

Visually I wanted something that looked a little more feminine, and gentle to the touch. Where as I spent much less time editing this piece, I spent more time on cinematography and atmosphere, I hope it comes through in this videopoem.

He also posted some detailed notes about his process that are well worth checking out.

Somewhere by Elise Stewart

Poem, vocals, music and video are all by the British neo-romantic poet Elise Stewart.