~ Nationality: Canada ~

Three Poems by Steven McCabe

On 15 February, 2011 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Author-made videopoems
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The poems are “Speed-dial a Rainbow,” “Bough,” and “Salome’s Veil.” McCabe directs with cinematography by Eric Gerard and editing by Konrad Skreta.

How to Remain by Heather Haley

On 11 February, 2011 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Videopoems
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Heather Haley wrote and directed this entertaining film about a very serious subject. Here’s her gloss from the video description on YouTube:

The audience is along for a wild ride in AURAL Heather’s “How To Remain” with a compulsive protagonist resolutely heading toward an elusive goal of perfection, perpetually struggling to stay *on* and, or to stay thin. *How to remain in control* is at the heart of anorexia and bulimia. Ubiquitous images of the ideal woman provide pressure and anxiety for us all. She turns to her trusty steed but instead of her body disintegrating, the horse’s body withers away. A symbol of intense desire and instinct, the horse’s ribs start to protrude as it becomes increasingly emaciated until finally disappearing with a *POOF! * Though eating disorders are a serious matter, the story is really about facing our all-too-human mortality. REMAIN is the key word and our secret desire, fueling our heroine’s quest for eternal youth and beauty, i.e., immortality. She is in a race. A horse race. A rat race? Or a labyrinth. Reel time accelerates as it does in real life; time seemingly flying by with advancing years as we move toward our inevitable departure. Of course HOW we live is what really matters.

Anansi Hides the Moon by Brenda Clews

On 10 February, 2011 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Author-made videopoems
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“Poem, painting and video by Brenda Clews,” as it says in the closing credits. Brenda’s process notes at her blog are almost as interesting as the result:

A painting, ‘Parchment Figures: Doubles, Doppelgängers, Clones,’ hanging on a wall. Sunlight moving through wind-waving branches falls through a window onto it. You can also see the shadows of the window itself. That morning I was absorbed watching the light and shadows dancing quietly over the painting and videotaped it. Then, on an evening walk I came across a light on a patio with a thick white gauzy curtain around it, and shot some footage with my iPhone video camera. Later, playing with the footage, I added the billowing curtain and its light next to the painting of doubles and shadows. Then I cut sections of a photograph of the painting out, animated them and added them to the film. Finally, pondering on what I had produced, I wrote a whimsical poem of the African trickster spider god, Anansi, and wove it in with handwritten notes.

Read the rest.

In Earth Dreams by Daniela Elza

On 24 January, 2011 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Animation, Concrete and visual poetry
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Interesting kinetic text animation by Daniela Elza’s husband Dethe, “programmed in NodeBox, final video produced using QuickTime and iMovie.” To me, this kind of fits in the “concrete poetry” category (though I admit that’s subjective, and I should probably just merge it into a kinetic text category).

Ghost Haiku by Susan Cormier

On 21 December, 2010 by Dave Bonta with 1 Comments - Author-made videopoems
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Susan Cormier A.K.A. queen of crows is both author and director. In the notes at YouTube, she says:

The guys in the foreground seemed kinda creeped-out by me and my camera — obviously, they couldn’t see what I was actually watching. If anyone knows who they are, please send them a link. I generally don’t use people’s images without their permission, but this shot was too precious to discard.

All This Day Is Good For by Tom Konyves

On 17 December, 2010 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Author-made videopoems
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A spam lit videopoem! Tom writes,

In this ode to the simultaneous, true and false perceptions collide in a 360-degree panoramic sweep of a moment in time, rendering life and art in equal measure.

The text in this videopoem was assembled from hundreds of spam/scam e-mails I have been collecting over the years, representing the lies we are confronted with every day; yet the random phrases extracted from these passion-laden letters cannot help but also contain unintentional glimpses of truth. In between mundane and altered reality lies that precious essence of life I see as poetry.

Alex Konyves assisted with — well, almost everything, it seems. And Robin Pittman helped with the motion graphics.

Purple Lipstick by Heather Haley

On 5 November, 2010 by Dave Bonta with 1 Comments - Author-made videopoems
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A poem about domestic violence, on YouTube courtesy of a magazine called Shattered Thought which appears to be no longer online. Heather Haley, however, is very much still online — in fact, the annual videopoetry festival she organizes in Vancouver, Visible Verse, will be celebrating its 10th anniversary on November 19-20. This is the premiere videopoetry event in North America. Go if you can.

The Videopoems page of her personal website says about this film, in part:

Heather’s videopoem Purple Lipstick still garners kudos having been an official selection at the VideoBardo 2nd International VideoPoetry Festival in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the 3rd Zebra International Poetry Film Festival in Berlin, Germany and the Women in Film Festival in Vancouver where she was a guest speaker. Purple Lipstick also screened at Commfest, Wildsound, Female Eye in Toronto, Northwest Projections and Reel to Real in Seattle.

Purple is the colour of a fresh bruise and domestic violence the single greatest cause of injury to women in Canada. Purple Lipstick confronts its insidious nature through compelling juxtapositions. A disembodied female voice employs vivid language, absurdist against a backdrop of banality, images of *normal* family life. Numb in her isolation and still in her nurse’s uniform, a wife and mother prepares dinner. The inherent terror of her home life is invoked with excruciating tension. Its brutality can only be alluded to.

Shot on Bowen Island near Vancouver, Purple Lipstick features actors Bazil Graham, Ripley Ferguson, Cairo Ferguson and slam poetry star Alexandra Oliver-Basekic.

The Neighbour Procedure by Rachel Zolf

On 3 October, 2010 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Performance Poetry, Videopoems
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The title poem of Rachel Zolf’s new book from Coach House Books, “a virtuoso polyvocal correspondence with the daily news, ancient scripture and contemporary theory that puts the ongoing conflict in Israel/Palestine firmly in the crosshairs.” Poetry blogger Joshua Corey calls it “A work of radical and rigorous empathy for Jew & Arab.”

I like the cut-up approach to a live-reading video here. Poet Laura Mullen is the filmmaker. For more on Rachel Zolf, see her author page at the Electronic Poetry Center.

Sign Language by Tom Konyves

On 23 September, 2010 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Author-made videopoems
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If one can use the term “classic” to describe something that’s only 26 years old, this videopoem certainly qualifies. I was surprised to discover I’ve never shared it here before. (I did post Eric Gamalinda’s similar “Front Toward Enemy,” which I assume was inspired by Konyves’ piece.)

Tom Konyves of course is the guy who coined the term “videopoetry,” and he’s done a lot to help definine and promote the genre. Be sure to check out the Moving Poems forum for his most recent summary of videopoetry, cross-posted from his Vimeo profile. Here’s what he says about “Sign Language” in the notes at Vimeo:

“Sign Language” (1984) is a videopoem constructed entirely from images of graffiti around the city of Vancouver. The rhythm of the work is created by the synchronized editing of the images with the soundtrack. The music I selected for the work, entitled “You Haunt Me”, is performed by the saxophonist John Lurie with the group Lounge Lizards. Unlike most of my work, the soundtrack complements the visual presentation. The title of the work contains the double meaning of hand-sign language, used to communicate with the deaf.

A pure example of “found poetry”, this videopoem gives voice to the faceless underground of Vancouver’s east side, bearing witness to their outrage and pain, their uncompromising and sometimes anarchic vision of the absurdity in our lives, all with a measured touch of humour to remind us that the family of man – no matter how far outcast we may be – includes each and every one of us.

The Men Who Don’t Fit In by Robert Service

On 9 September, 2010 by Dave Bonta with 3 Comments - Performance Poetry
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Poem by Robert Service, recited by Christopher Herwig, 1-2 lines a day while hiking and rafting across Iceland with Alastair Humphreys from North to South in July 2010.

Mr. Herwig is also the filmmaker here, I think. Some very good editing and of a course a brilliant idea, even if one does get a little tired of looking at him by the end of it. Their journey across Iceland was truly epic, judging from Alastair’s report:

The plan was simple: we were trekking inland from Iceland’s north coast up into the central highlands. We would cross the Hofsjokull ice cap to gain access to the headwaters of Iceland’s longest river. There we would inflate the packrafts we were carrying and attempt to paddle down two separate rivers, eventually reaching the southern coast of Iceland, the ocean, and the end of our expedition.

We were carrying everything we needed. There would be no villages or resupplies on our route. We carried food for 25 days. We had camping equipment, and ropes and crampons for the glacier crossing. There was a fair weight of camera equipment, batteries and solar panel chargers. And we also were carrying all the gear you need for paddling glacial whitewater rivers. The weight of the packs crushed our knees and spine and gouged our shoulders and hips. We feared that we had bitten off more than we could chew.

How to be Alone by Tanya Davis

On 1 September, 2010 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Animation, Performance Poetry
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Another videopoem gone viral, with well over a million views at time of posting. It’s not high art, but I guess like a lot of people I love the message here, and I thought the film was charming, too. Andrea Dorfman is the filmmaker. Tanya Davis is the actor/performer as well as the author, justifying this video’s inclusion in my Spoken Word category.

One Hand Clapping by Brenda Clews

On 23 June, 2010 by Dave Bonta with 0 Comments - Author-made videopoems, Concrete and visual poetry
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Toronto-based painter and poet Brenda Clews has recently begun to explore videopoetry, with some very interesting results. Concrete or visual poetry often strikes me as more art than poem, but I like what this one says about rain — and about poetry. The words are right at hand, but remain out of reach. (If you have the bandwidth for it, this is available in HD, as well — click through to view it on YouTube.)

Another exciting thing about this production is the double-blind collaborative way it came about, alluded to in the title and explained in the credits at the end:

Brenda created a short film
for unheard music

Gabriel created music
for an unseen film

Gabriel is the avant garde musician Gabriel G, a.k.a. Alphacore.

See Brenda’s lengthy description and analysis of the piece at her blog, Rubies in Crystal.