Experimental 2024
Exposed to Each Other
Exposed to Each Other
0:13:00
Austria
Touches are journeys - a film poem about the multi-faceted journey of interpersonal, intercultural encounters. How are we connected with each other? Based on a poetic text collage by Marion Steinfellner, which brings together Indian, Japanese, German, and Austrian texts by Yuko Kaseki, Savita Rani, Mersolis Schöne, and Marion Steinfellner.
Mersolis Schöne, Director, Writer, Producer,
poetic text fragments
Marion Steinfellner, Writer, Producer, Voice, Poem Collage, basic text fragments, Key Cast, “Dancer”
Savita Rani, basic poetic text fragments,
Key Cast, "Dancer"
Yuko Kaseki, basic poetic text fragments,
Key Cast, "Dancer”
Michael Fischer, Sound and Composition
Vlad Krypak, Beat and Flute Arrangement
Apollina Smaragd, Flute Improvisation
Gold
Gold
0:02:18
New Zealand
Bridget Sutherland, Director/producer
Hamish Kilgour, Writer, Musician / Composer
William Blake, Writer, Poet
Stuart Page, ProducerDirector,
A hand painted music poem for the song 'Gold' by Hamish Kilgour of the New Zealand indie band The Clean. The video poem also quotes from the Introduction to 'Songs of Experience' by William Blake and focuses on animal and environmental themes.
Gold was recorded for Kilgour's LP 'Finkelstein' on Ba Da Bing Records New York (2018).
Hidden Life
Hidden Life
0:04:19
United States
Chap Edmonson, Director
Elina Petrova, Writer, Voice
This cinepoem explores code-switching, cultural humility, and hidden complexities that lay behind simple stories of joy, trauma, and wonder rooted in the perpetual summer of Houston, as seen by one born here and by one who fled to here from atrocities in her wintry native land.
How To Outline Grief
How To Outline Grief
0:05:48
United States
Kym McDaniel, Director
Elisabeth O’Keefe Roskopf, Key Cast
Soeyi Jung, Poetry Narration
Different water worlds - sea, snow, tears, bodies - collide as grief is poetically explored through movement and landscape.
Identity Portraits
Identity Portraits
0:18:53
United States
Seven short portrait films that weave together spoken word and visual form to reflect the identity of individuals from the transgender and nonbinary community. These works transcend the negative stigma that has been the norm with the joy and power that is real and present throughout the community.
- Sasha Marie Speer, Director, Producer
- Jaden Smith, Writer
- Grey Jeán, Writer
- Nancy Azcona, Writer
- Andy Sánchez, Writer
- Liam Woods, Writer
- Jay Baldwin, Writer
- Pastiche Queen, Writer
- William Serri, Producer
- Steve Galindo, Producer
- Amber Riat, Key Cast
- Armani Dae, Key Cast
- Chanel Lumiere, Key Cast
- Cley Kim, Key Cast
- Grey Rain, Key Cast
- Justine Duldulao, Key Cast
- Liam Woods, Key Cast
- Neverending Nina, Key Cast
- mell-Jahlil Travis, Key Cast
- Skylar Kardon, Key Cast
- Trent Tucci, Key Cast
- True Justice Jones, Key Cast
- Vula Alfaro, Key Cast
It Started With a Breeze
It Started With a Breeze
0:03:13
United States
Margo Stutts Toombs, Director, Writer, Producer
Lindsey McGillKey Cast"Dancer"
It Started with a Breeze is a video poem about the beginning and end of a romantic relationship.
Beloved Grey-Haired
Beloved Grey-Haired
0:01:17
Ukraine
Nastasiia Kirii, Director, Writer, Producer, Key Cast
Iryna Kalamurza, Director of Photography
Iryna Kalamurza, Video Editor, Color Grading
Elena Karaseva, Camera Assistant
Read her hair as if it was a book and look into her experience fleeing the war in
Ukraine.
Director: When the war started in Ukraine, I moved to Barcelona, got there by 9 trains with my dog Penka. This is the first film I created as a reflection to this experience.
Only Dark From the Outside
Only Dark From the Outside
0:06:33
United States
Eleonora Privitera, Director, Writer, Producer, Key Cast
Eugenio Pizzorno, Director, Writer, Producer
Kris Casey, Writer, Key Cast
This is an experimental visual representation of the poem “ Aphorisms on Futurism”, a poem by Mina Loy (1882-1966). It is a performance film that is the result of a collective interpretation. Our aim was to capture and re-create visually through free association, the feelings, emotions, intellectual meanings and the moods inspired and associated with the artist’s statement.
Mina Loy was painter and poet, a charter member of the generation that began in 1912 with the founding of Poetry magazine. It launched the modernist revolution in poetry in the United States. Mina Loy has been associated with most of the literary and artistic movements of the early 20th century: dadaism, surrealism, futurism, feminism, modernism and post-modernism.
Loy, a writer known for her frank embrace of female sexuality and feminist politics, joined the futurist movement in 1913, but she quickly encountered conflict regarding the movement’s perception of women.
Her manifesto addresses those conflicts within a context of support for the movement’s forwards- looking vision. Loy sees the female body as a site of resistance, and advocates affirmation and growth rather than destruction.
Son of Samoa
Son of Samoa
0:10:42
New Zealand
Laman Time, Director, Writer, Producer, Key Cast
Bonni Luafutu Tamati, Key Cast
Inia Taylor, Key Cast
Son of Samoa takes you through the journey of Tatau.
Identity is explored in a way physically, spiritually and mentally that most have not
endured. In this doco, dir. Laman discusses his disconnection from family, community
and wavering relationship with himself.
With supporting voices, Tamoko/Tufuga artist Inia Taylor, speaks on the importance
of belonging and how to navigate that through cultural traditions. Bonni Tamati, a
Pacific art advocate also expresses her love for self-discovery and how love within
oneself can help spread love around you.
This is a story of hope, a story shared for all, a story of self-love.
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The Bridge
The Bridge
0:02:14
United States
Liesa Cole, Director
Gabrielle Bates, Writer
Liesa Cole, Producer
Gabrielle Bates, Key Cast
An adaptation of The Bridge by Gabrielle Bates.
"A deeply personal and collaborative project that holds great significance to me. The Bridge not only serves as a metaphor, but also becomes the vehicle for a powerful multi-generational exploration."
-Director, Liesa Cole.
("The Bridge"), from the acclaimed Judas Goat collection by Gabrielle Bates, published by Tin House books. The film emerges as a surreal progression of imagery, as she delivers the poem in her own voice, at turns ethereal and startling.
The Carousel
The Carousel
0:03:00
Germany
Florian Schlotzhauer, Director
Its a poetic essay.
Come take my hand. Lets go to the fair. Where the beautiful lights do flicker and dance.
What remains of the ecstasy once the carousel has stopped?
The sensation of spinning while standing still.
Vertigo.
The Carousel is a semester work at FH Dortmund. It documents the Cranger Kirmes in Herne Germany and explores the effects of Vertigo as a form of entertainment. Its a poetic essay.
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The Garden Echoes
The Garden Echoes
0:03:36
Canada
Vivian Li, Director, Writer, Producer, Key Cast, Editor, Composer and Music Recording
Emma LeckProducer
Ngaire Lyden-Elleray, Director of Photography
Anjali Mandapaka, Creative Assistant
Ngaire Lyden-Elleray, Colorist
The Garden Echoes, explores the lingering echoes of gardens for a young woman recovering from grief and in a search for home.
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The Revolution Will Have It Its Sky
The Revolution Will Have its Sky:
A Poem in One Act
0:10:28
Germany
Maria Garcia Teutsch, Director, Writer
River Atwood Tabor, Producer
Natalia Gaia, Cinematography/Editing
Ambrose Bye, Original Score
The Revolution Will Have its Sky is a cinepoem in one act; it takes place inside a prison while a revolution is being waged outside. The central question of the piece centers on the place of pacifism in the face of the oppressive brutality and injustice of a cruel system, one which favors force over words. The central character, the Poet, has been condemned to 30 lashes because of a poem she wrote which criticized the king and subsequently went viral. 'The Revolution Will Have its Sky' is a play and a poem and in that sense it already defies many boundaries. What it says continues the radical pushing of the nomos, enacting a revolutionary poetics. The dialogue itself comes to the audience in a form like zen koans. This furthers the purpose of the revolutionary poetics advanced in the piece. By having the poetic life and revolutionary life symbolically linked with each other through isomorphic imagery, a cognitive link is formed in the mind of the audience between revolutionary praxis and poetic praxis.
Special Selections from Blank Verse Library
On Anti-Biography
On Anti-Biography
On Anti-Biography
On Anti-Biography
0:04:27
United States
Poem by Will Alexander
Filmed by Mike Gioia
Filmed in & around poet Will Alexander's home in Los Angeles, this video is a portrait of a lifelong resident of Los Angeles and his infectious fascination with the city. We trekked around MacArthur Park for several hours that afternoon as Alexander spurted out observations and comments about the city and its structure. Alexander does not take language for granted. He's constantly twisting it into new phrases and ideas in his head. Working jobs that gave him "space to think" for most of his life, Alexander has developed a poetic style virtually untouched by fashionable trends and 'The Poetry Industrial Complex.
The Problem
On Anti-Biography
On Anti-Biography
The Problem
0:03:16
United States
Poem by Thorn Gunn
Director, Steven Lai
Steven Lai adapts Thom Gunn's "The Problem", an artful poem about LGBTQ relations in the 1960s. In this poem Gunn provides a nuanced telling of one night stand between two strangers and the resonant realization that follows the next morning.