~ ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival ~
Zebra Poetry Film Festival Münster 2016: a view from the jury
The international ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival has a new home in Münster. In 2016, for the very first time, the Filmwerkstatt Münster, in cooperation with Literaturwerkstatt Berlin/Haus für Poesie, hosted the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival Münster|Berlin. The festival was located at Schloßtheater, a beautiful 1950s Art Deco cinema in Münster.
The focus of this year’s ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival Münster|Berlin was the Netherlands and Flanders (Belgium). Since I’m Flemish, maybe that was one of the reasons they asked me to be on the jury.
I did not get a chance to see other than the selected films this year, nor to visit any of the extras that ZEBRA’s program had to offer. Maybe that’s a shame, but maybe it also made me a more focused visitor than I was at my previous visits to Zebra.
Jury Duty
Eighty films. That’s how many we had to see in two days. Eighty films from which to pick four winners. Hmm… That’s a lot.
The other members of the jury were filmmaker and festival organizer Juliane Fuchs and poet Sabine Scho — two women with a clear view and a strong interest in videopoetry/poetry films. They were also a delight to work with.
A few things I’d like to say about our goals as jury: We congratulate all the filmmakers, artists and poets who were chosen by the selection committee. We saw some fantastic films and wonderful creations this year, and were proud to play a part in the international competitions. We as ‘the jury’ wanted to make a statement. We believe that more films should have been awarded a prize. Not because it was too difficult to pick just four winners, no — that was fairly easy. We believe that more artists deserve a prize, and would prefer the budget for prizes to be split up to go to more ‘winners.’
So as ‘the jury,’ we were happy that we managed to pick six winners (instead of just four) and give three special mentions this year. On top of that, we also presented a list of films that deserved to be noted as well — films we could not award with a prize, but were too good not to mention:
Kaspar Hauser Song (Director: Susanne Wiegner, Poem: Georg Trakl)
Tzayri Lee Tzeeyur | Paint Me A Painting (Director: Jasmine Kainy, Poem: Hedva Harechavi)
Viento | Wind (Director & Poem: David Argüelles)
The Headless Nun (Director: Nuno de Sá Pessoa Costa Sequeira, Poem: Kris Skovmand)
Long Rong Song (Director: Alexander Vojjov, Poem: Ottar Ormstad)
The Poster Reads: ACTIVE SHOOTER EVENT (Director: Cheryl Gross, Poem: Nicelle Davis)
I Could Eat A Horse (Director & Poem: Jake Hovell)
What about the law (Director: Charles Badenhurst, Poem: Adam Small)
Refugee Blues (Director: Stephan Bookas, Poem: W.H. Auden)
If it were up to me, I would have invited (and paid) all 80 filmmakers/poets and only given prizes as an honor instead. Because the quality of those 80 chosen poetry films was so high.
The jury also felt that the selection committee left a lot of more experimental films out that we would have appreciated seeing. That is, of course, their right. It’s all about taste, after all. This year’s selection, like selections of previous years, was stuffed with many films from art schools and production companies. And that’s OK — these films have a great (technical) quality.
But the jury missed the not-so-perfect films. We missed the loner with the camera and the crazy idea. We often missed a strong poetic involvement. Brilliant technique, fantastic visuals, strong sounds and music, moving performances and lovely creatures do not always make up for the lack of a poetic experience. We really think we should encourage everyone who wants to make a poetry film (and to submit it to ZEBRA) to do so. No matter whether she or he only has a cellular with a camera and an idea, just go for it. Art should not be about equipment and/or budgets.
If you see hundreds of really well-made films — films that they could broadcast on TV any night of the week — then we jury members were looking for the one film that no one will show on TV. We tried to look beyond the well-made surfaces. If, as an artist, you feel a pressure to say something, then: say it with pressure, and not only with the perfect surface a consumer-orientated society supplies you with.
Many of the films we saw, said: here we are, ready to be melted, we already fit in your slots. Maybe young filmmakers and artists shouldn’t cooperate so eagerly right from the start.
But that’s something else altogether. We were there to pick winners. And yes, there were films that blew me and the other jury members away. Films that raised questions but left out the answers (Off the Trail; Director: Jacob Cartwright & Nick Jordan – Poem: “Endless streams and mountains” by Gary Snyder). Films that had the perfect surface and a wonderful technique, but also connected with the poem and left plenty of room for the viewer (Steel and Air; Director: Chris & Nick Libbey – Poem: “Steel and Air“ by John Ashbery). And films that stopped being ‘perfect combinations of different artforms’ and simply were stunning because they ‘simply were,’ in their own right, a work of art, pure and elegant (Goldfish; Director: Rain Kencana – Poem: “Goldfish“, by Shuntaro Tanikawa).
Some of the films showcased a strong sense of humor combined with a political impulse (Calling All; by Manuel Vilarinho – poem: “Chamada Geral” by Mário Henrique Leiria). Others just made you smile all the way through (Hail the Bodhisattva of Collected Junk; Director: Ye Mimi – Poem: “Hail the Bodhisattva of Collected Junk”) or cry (Process:Breath; Director: Line Klungseth Johansen – Poem: “Process:Breath“ by Line Klungseth Johansen).
I’m not going to describe all of the films we picked. (See the complete list on the ZEBRA website.) I hope that they will be all online in due time (and on Moving Poems from that day on).
But for now: Google them. Search them. Take your time looking for those that already are online. Listen and watch. See them again and again. And dive into the marvel that they are.
Upcoming poetry-film and videopoetry screenings
Autumn is usually a busy time for poetry-film events around the world, and I never quite manage to announce all of them, but it’s interesting to note their number and diversity even if this comes too late for some. In that category goes this past Friday’s screening of videopoetry in Mallorca, Sinestesia, with twelve films from Spain and abroad. It’s not too late, though, for anyone in Argentina this week to make plans to attend one of VideoBardo’s 20th anniversary festival screenings from the 8th to the 12th. And even those of us who can’t make it should extend our congratulations to the festival’s organizers for an extraordinarily long and successful run.
Coming up a week from Wednesday, on November 16, the winning films from this year’s ZEBRA festival will be screened in Berlin at the Zebra Poetry Gala.
The ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival Münster/Berlin celebrates its prizewinning films. Shortly after the 8th edition of the festival has been brought to a close in Münster, the winners of four competitions come to Berlin. “Kino-King” Knut Elstermann from radioeins presents the winning films and filmmakers, along with musical guests.
And finally, I’ve gotten word of one more screening of Justin Stephenson’s poetry film The Complete Works, for a total of two remaining in 2016: the first at the Niagara Artists Centre in Saint Catharines, Ontario on November 23 at 8:00 p.m., and the second in Winnipeg at the Cinemateque on December 15 at 7:00 p.m.
I should also note that although no date has been set yet for International Film Poetry Festival in Athens (sometime in December, I guess), submissions remain open through November 20.
Chamada Geral / Calling All by Mário-Henrique Leiria
“Calling all! A man walks free,” reads the description at ZEBRA, where this film by Manuel Vilarinho of a poem by Mário-Henrique Leiria was awarded Special Mention in the Prize for the Best Film for Tolerance. The ZEBRA website also has a short bio for Manuel Vilarinho:
Born in Portugal, 1974. Graduated in Tecnologia da Comunicação Audiovisual by IPP, Instituto Politécnico do Porto in 2004. He won several awards at video film festivals and currently works on TVI, Independent Television in Portugal.
The English Wikipedia entry for the poet is similarly brief:
Mário-Henrique Leiria (1923–1980) was a Portuguese surrealist poet. Born in Lisbon, he studied at the Escola de Belas Artes. He and his fellow surrealists were involved in an absurdist plot to overthrow the dictatorship of Antonio Salazar. He is best known for his books Contos do Gin-Tonic (Gin and Tonic Tales, 1973) and Novos Contos do Gin (More Gin Tales, 1974). He died in 1980.
Music is Made Out of Smoke by Tanya Shirley
Iranian-British filmmaker Roxana Vilk with a poem by Jamaican poet Tanya Shirley. It’s described on the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival website as a “tribute to Jamaican reggae artist Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry and an elegy to the sultry fields of the American South.” The Vimeo description notes that it was “Commissioned for Commonwealth Games 2014 by Scottish Poetry Library, British Council and Creative Scotland and executive produced by Scottish Poetry Library & United Creations Collective.” According to Vilk’s website, it was one of eight short films she directed and produced for her Composing the Commonwealth series in 2014 featuring four different poets, the camera work of Ian Dodds, sound and music by Peter Vilk, and editing by Ling Lee and Maryam Ghorbankarimi. Go watch.
Послушайте / Please listen! by Vladimir Mayakovsky
This wonderfully disturbing film by Natalia Alfutova was recognized by the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival 2016 jury as a Special Mention for the Goethe Film Prize. Be sure to click the closed captioning (CC) icon for the English translation. Here’s the description from the ZEBRA website:
The Dummy and its mirror-reflection are in the waiting room of God. They mimic the Human-talk and the God dancing.
Natalia Alfutova
was born in Moscow and studied Mathematics at the Moscow State University, movie directing at ‘Higher Director’s Courses’ Moscow,, and multimedia art at The Rodchenko Art School (Moscow). In 2014 she founded “Mediamead” art studio. Artworks of this studio are based on the mix of math, cinema and multimedia art. In last two years Natalia made a number of installations, which were shown in different Moscow Museums and art places.
Much to my own surprise, this is the first Mayakovsky poem I’ve ever shared a video for. I was sure I must’ve found others over the years, but apparently not.
Those Drawn Alive by Jukka-Pekka Jalovaara
An author-made filmpoem by Jukka-Pekka Jalovaara, inspired by the archetypal Spaghetti Western villain Lee Van Clef. The description on its ZEBRA website page reads:
Every autumn I get heavily moody. This is caused by the loss of the light. Last summer I heard from the radio a tune called “The House of the Rising Sun”. At once I was on a wintery road, with a very low light – and having an impossible opponent against me – Lee Van Cleef.
Jukka-Pekka Jalovaara
born 1965 in Kuopio, Finland, attended the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts and studied scenography and architecture. His work focuses mainly on drawing, photography and experimental motion pictures and has been shown in Finland and abroad.
The evocative soundtrack is by Samuli Kristian Saastamoinen.
Winners of the 2016 ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival competitions announced
NRW competition (photo from the ZEBRA website)
The biannual ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival, the world’s largest and most prestigious such event, has just concluded in Münster, and they wasted no time in updating their website with the results. I hope they won’t mind if I copy and paste the entire English-language text of the anouncement here, but do go visit their website when you get a chance. Among other goodies, they have photo galleries from each day of the festival.
The ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival Münster | Berlin announced its winners on 30 October 2016. 80 films were nominated from the 1,100 entries from 86 countries and shown in the international and German-language competition. There was also a North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) competition featuring a further 18 films. More than 220 poetry films were featured in the competitions and programmes of the festival, which ran from 27 to 30 October in the Schloßtheater Cinema in Münster.
The award winners were picked by the festival jury. On this year’s jury were filmmaker and festival organiser Juliane Fuchs, Belgian video and sound artist Marc Neys and poet Sabine Scho. The prizes are worth a total of € 12,000.
The ZEBRA Prize for the Best Poetry Film, donated by the Haus für Poesie:
Off the Trail (GB 2015)
Director: Jacob Cartwright & Nick Jordan
Poem: “Endless streams and mountains” by Gary SnyderThe Goethe Film Prize is donated by the Goethe Institute. It goes in equal parts to:
Goldfish (D 2016)
Director: Rain Kencana
Poem: “Golden Fish“, by Shuntaro TanikawaProcess:Breath (N 2016)
Director: Line Klungseth Johansen
Poem: “Process:Breath“ by Line Klungseth JohansenSpecial mention: PLEASE LISTEN! (RU 2014) by Natalia Alfutova (poem: “Please Listen“ by Vladimir Mayakovsky)
The Prize for the Best Film for Tolerance is donated by the German Foreign Ministry (Auswärtiges Amt). It goes in equal parts to:
Steel and Air (USA 2016)
Director: Chris & Nick Libbey
Poem: “Steel and Air“ by John AshberyHail the Bodhisattva of Collected Junk (TWN 2015)
Director: Ye Mimi
Poem: “Hail the Bodhisattva of Collected Junk“ by Ye MimiSpecial mention: Calling All (P 2015) by Manuel Vilarinho (poem: „Chamada Geral“ by Mário Henrique Leiria)
The “Ritter Sport Prize” in the German language competition, donated by Alfred Ritter GmbH und Co KG:
The wolf fearing the wolf (D 2014)
Director: Juliane Jaschnow
Poem: “Die Angst des Wolfs vor dem Wolf“ by Stefan PetermannSpecial mention: Vacancy (D 2016) by Urte Zintler (poem: „Leerstelle“ by Hilde Domin).
The audience prize in the NRW competition, donated by Deutsche Lufthansa AG:
Birds on wires (D 2014)
Director: Dean Ruddock
Poem: „Vögel auf Stromleitungen“ by Dean RuddockThe ZEBRINO Prize for the Poetry Film for Children and Young People went to:
Autumn (F 2016)
Director: Hugo de Faucompret
Poem: „Automne“ by Guillaume Apollinaire
The award winning film was chosen by the young audience. The prize is worth € 500.The winning films will be shown in Berlin at the ZEBRA Poetry Film Gala on 16 November 2016, 8 pm, as part of the interfilm – International Short Film Festival Berlin. Location: Hackesche Höfe Cinema, Rosenthaler Str. 40-41, 10178 Berlin
www.haus-fuer-poesie.orgThe festival was founded in 2002 by the Haus für Poesie, formerly the Literaturwerkstatt Berlin, and is the world’s biggest platform for poetry films, which are short films based on poems.
The festival was organised and hosted by the Filmwerkstatt Münster in co-operation with the Haus für Poesie. It was made possible by the support from the Kunststiftung NRW, the LWL Kulturstiftung, the State of North Rhine-Westphalia and the City of Münster, the Stiftung der Sparkasse Münsterland Ost, the Kulturrucksack NRW, and from the Consulate General of the Netherlands and the Flemish Representation. The festival is also supported by the Münstersche Filmtheater-Betriebe, by GUCC grafik & film, by the Factory Hotel, by interfilm – International Short Film Festival and by the filmclub münster.
Congratulations to all the winners, as well as to everyone accepted for screening at the festival.
You Are 6 Years Old and She is Teaching You How to Ride a Bicycle by Stephanie Dogfoot
https://vimeo.com/134787597
Stephanie Dogfoot is a performance poet with numerous slam championships in Singapore and the UK under her belt, but here filmmaker Sarah Howell of the Dream Bravely production company has made the unusual (for performance poetry) decision to focus not on the poet but on the poem, with salutary results. This is also a great example of how to use video to drive home the political message of a poem. It was made in collaboration with the Haque Centre of Acting & Creativity for “the August [2015] installment of their storytelling night Metaphors Be With You: Childhood Stories,” according to a blog post by Dogfoot. Michael Lim was the cinematographer, with music by Celer and Konrad Feucht.
This is one of the films in the Zebrino Competition at the upcoming ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival next week, and I need to give a tip of the hat to the ZEBRA Poetry Film Club channel on Vimeo, which has been adding films at a great rate in the build-up to the festival. I’ll be sourcing films from that channel for weeks to come, but if you can’t wait, go there now and gorge.
ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival’s complete list of films, English-language program online
https://vimeo.com/185122525
With the biannual ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival — the world’s largest and most prestigious such event — less than a month away, their website is replete with information, including what should be of most interest even to those who (like me) can’t attend: lists of all the films in each screening. Access those via the main programme page. They also issued a press release on Wednesday; here’s the English version:
ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival Münster | Berlin – The Program
For the first time, the Zebra Poetry Film Festival Münster | Berlin will be held in Münster from 27-30 October at cinema Schloßtheater. Established in Berlin in 2002, the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival was the first and remains the largest international platform for cinematic adaptations of poetry: poetry films
With three poetry-film competitions – one international, one German, and one North Rhine-Westphalia based – as well as themed film programmes, a retrospective on TV poetry hosted by Klaus-Peter Dencker, readings, a Colloquium, a lineup for younger audiences called ZEBRINO and a lineup focused on works from the Flanders and the Netherlands, ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival 2016 promises to showcase the richness and diversity in the emerging film genre of poetry films.
This year, more than 1,100 submissions from 86 countries were submitted to the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival Münster | Berlin, among which 80 have been nominated by the program commission to compete in the international and national competitions. Four prizes totaling €12,000 will be awarded by the three-member international jury, including the “ZEBRA Award for the best poetry film”, the “Goethe Film Award”, the “Ritter Sport Film Award”, as well as the “Award for the Best film for Tolerance”. Additionally, 18 films will be presented in the newly established NRW (North Rhine-Westphalia) competition.
The Flanders and Netherlands Focus
As part of the official programme of the Frankfurt Book Fair, ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival Münster | Berlin will bring into focus Dutch language and literature this year, and present work of artists from Netherlands and Flanders. With selected poetry films from this year’s submissions, award-winning classics and the results of the Master Class “Poetry across the borders”, ZEBRA will showcase the diversity in language arts in the area between the dunes and the polders through poetry readings and Film Talks.
In this year’s festival, we have permission from Dutch poet Mustafa Stitou, author of the poem oracle van een gevonden schoen, to use said poem as a theme for short films. The six best among the filmmakers who decided to center their film on oracle van een gevonden schoen have been invited to Münster to present and engage in discussions of their work.
The Festival Committee has also organised a Retrospective on the work of Klaus Peter Dencker, visual poet and literary scholar, who is widely considered to be the inventor of the TV poetry. Klaus Peter Dencker created the Sequencing form, which in turn has influenced his work of visual poetry. Throughout his years in the television industry, he played an important role in creating more than 100 documentary and experimental films for ARD and ZDF, including influential experimental films like starfighter, rausch and Austronaut, which were broadcast over the now defunct SWF of Baden-Baden during 1970-1971. Professor Dencker will be present at the festival to talk about his work.
ZEBRINO Program for Young Audiences
The ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival Münster/Berlin will make poetic forays with younger audiences. What is a poetry film? Where does the idea of making a cinematic poem come from? What is a poem? ZEBRINO is a lineup of colorful short films based on poems which target audiences of 10-14 years old and aims to bring children closer to the genre of poetry film. In this program, the young visitors will not only meet a rabbit-turtle, a black bear, people with funny mice, but also travel with two brothers back into their past. In the end, the young participants will get to choose their favorite film by voting. The film with the most votes wins the ZEBRINO competition 2016 prize worth 500 euros.
The Zebra Poetry Festival is organized by the Filmwerkstatt Münster in cooperation with the Haus für Poesie (formerly Literaturwerkstatt, Berlin). It is made possible by the support of Kunststiftung NRW, the LWL Kulturstiftung, the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, the city of Münster, the Stiftung der Sparkasse Münsterland Ost, the Kulturrucksack NRW, the Netherlands Consulate General and the Flemish Embassy. The competition prizes have been donated in 2016 by the Haus für Poesie, the Goethe Institute, the Federal Foreign Office of Germany, the Alfred Ritter GmbH & Co. KG and Deutsche Lufthansa AG. The festival is also supported by the Münstesche Filmtheater-Betriebe, GUCC grafik & film, as well as the Factory Hotel.
ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival program is online
The ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival posted their program to the web yesterday, and judging from Google Translate, there’s a great deal of continuity with past festivals despite the change in hosting organizations (from Literaturwerkstatt Berlin to Filmwerkstatt Münster), as well as some interesting new features. The international competition drew more than 1100 submissions from 86 countries, from which the nominating committee selected 80 films for the competition. There are also new competitions for German-language films and films from the North Rhine-Westphalia region. Six films were chosen for screening from the 20 submitted in response to the festivalgedicht (festival poem), “Orakel van een gevonden schoen” by Mustafa Stitou.
Every ZEBRA festival includes a focus country or region; this year it’s Flanders and the Netherlands.
With selected poetry films from this year’s submissions, award-winning classics and the results of the Master Class ‘Poetry across the borders,’ ZEBRA presents the variety of that language area between dunes and polders. The emphasis will be supplemented with poetic readings and exciting film talks. [via Google]
As for the master class,
The joint workshop of the Filmwerkstatt Münster and Filmwerkstatt DZIGA in Nijmegen (NL) allowed two participants from both countries the production of a poetry film. The group met regularly for working meetings under the direction of filmmakers Rainer Komers and Bea de Visser. The focus of all films are the poems of the Dutch poet Frouke Arns, who had presented her texts in person at the first meeting in Nijmegen. Duringn July and August, the filmmakers and directors Victorine van Alphen, Ruut van der Beele, Christian Fries and Sina Seiler gave visual expression to each one of the featured poems. [via Google]
And there’s much more going on during the four-day festival — click through to read the whole program.
