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2022 Midwest Video Poetry Fest Screening 2
This year's festival will be presented Friday, October 21 and Saturday, October 22, 2022 in person at ALL and features two exciting new additions—a family matinee with special short films made by and/or for kids and a live poetry reading and film collaboration. Each screening will have a unique lineup of films. See individual programs for full details. All events are free and open to the public.
This unique film festival celebrates the amazing breadth of expression when one of humanity’s oldest art forms is interpreted through the lens of one of its newest. It has featured the best of this cutting-edge art form throughout the Midwest and from around the world, including work from 21 states and 28 countries. The featured videos range from 55 seconds to under 6 minutes long. They have all been created within the last two years, many of them within the last few months, promising a fresh, contemporary point of view. Come discover new poets from the Midwest and around the world, as well as seeing old favorites in a completely new light.
Friday, October 21
7:00 PM: Screening One
Saturday, October 22
3:00 PM: Family Matinee
5:30 PM: Live Film + Poetry Event
7:00 PM: Screening Two
1) Miracle Whip: A Memoir (5m37s)
Directed by Jerod Willis
Written by Jerod Willis
Michigan, United States
The world in which we live forces us to be consumed with our status in society. This ongoing pressure can be found in social media, the clothes we wear, the places we dine, and the cars we drive. As we go about our daily lives, we often strive to be who the world says we should be. This futile pursuit ultimately leaves us questioning our value and worth. Instead of showing gratitude for the life we have, we often treat ourselves as an old car in search of something new. Just like a used car salesman, we repeatedly ask ourselves “what are we worth?”
2) Extract (1m05s)
Directed by Samer Ghani
Written by Dasha Kelly Hamilton
Wisconsin, United States Dasha Kelly Hamilton's Website
Spoken word video celebrating love and food by Wisconsin Poet Laureate Dasha Kelly Hamilton. Filmed and directed by Samer Ghani.
3) How to Survive a Nuclear Attack (2m52s)
Directed by Angela Voras Hills
Written by Angela Voras Hills
Wisconsin, United States
In "The House in the Middle," a video created by the Department of Civil Defense in the 1950s, a man behind a desk suggest mothers can protect their families from a nuclear attack if they keep their homes clean enough. "How to Survive a Nuclear Attack" explores this response and media's role in the perpetuation of fear in domestic spaces.
4) Slipped (1m30s)
Directed by Eve Kalugin
Written by Eve Kalugin
Illinois, United States Eve Kalugin's website
The subject of the video is the central figure in Marche en Campagne, a lithograph by Jean Dubuffet from 1975. The location of the piece in a domestic setting is such that the reflections from its surroundings—the backdrop, the windows, the other objects in the living room—almost always infiltrate the portrait, no matter the time of day. The object silently asks: Can we separate the art from the time and context in which it is made? In “Slipped,” the figure—suggestive of refugees, prisoners, soldiers and ordinary people all simultaneously fighting and fleeing—plots their escape from the frame and seeks refuge in the reflections from the glass, the life outside the print, where the borders between home and exile become blurred.
5) Today I Wrote Nothing (3m29s)
Directed by Keith Sargent
Written by Daniil Kharms
United States
Russian absurdist writing made flesh from the beautiful micro-fiction words of early Soviet avant garde writer Daniil Kharms.
6) Nowhere to go but on (3m33s)
Directed by Janet Lees
Written by Janet Lees
Isle of Man
This film is based on a cento using lines from poems by Christian Wiman, Anne Sexton, Tracy K Smith, Heid E Edrich, and Wendell Berry. It is also inspired by Martyn Cain’s hauntingly beautiful piece of music "Taeym." Created just before the second coronavirus lockdown, it reflects not only on the pandemic situation, but also the infinitely more deadly, but still largely overlooked, threat to life as we know it: climate breakdown. In the face of the end times, where can we go but on?
7) Happiness (2m07s)
Directed by Ryan Tynan
Written by Ryan Tynan
Illinois, United States
A story of a psychic and his dreams of becoming a clown, "Happiness" is an introspective short film about the desire to look into one's future. The result is a humorous portrayal of self realization.
8) We Can Be Pirates (5m18s)
Directed by Sven Stears
Written by Nina Telegina
United Kingdom
"We Can Be Pirates" is by Nina Telegina, a performance poet who was born in Moscow, has lived in Boston and Kyiv, and now resides in Kent, UK. The poem is a polyvocal story of hope, and unity, in the face of trauma.
9) The Perfection of Chance (1m30s)
Directed by Mark Niehus
Written by Mark Niehus
Australia Mark Niehus's Website
“The Perfection of Chance,” a poetry film that depicts a mental health patient describing to his therapist one of his experiences. The poem was composed using the technique of automatism and is supported by the film's composition, which strives to present a surrealist painting that has come to life. The combination of surrealist language and imagery invites the viewer to step into the patient’s version of reality. The aim is to use this unique medium to raise awareness of mental health.
10) Matairangi—Mt Vic Tunnel (2m39s)
Directed by Sebastian J. Lowe
Written by Ruby Solly (Kai Tahu, Waitaha)
New Zealand
Legend has it that while the Mt Vic Tunnel was being built in the early 1930s, tunnel worker George Coatts murdered his 17-year-old girlfriend, Phillis Symonds, who was carrying his child, dumping her body in the foundations of the tunnel. Commuters now honk their horns in part to pay tribute to Phillis, and in part to ensure their safety from her ghost which is rumored to haunt the tunnel.
11) Questions regarding the deaths of two Covenanter women at Wigtown in 1685 (2m52s)
Directed by Sue Thomas
Written by Elizabeth Burns
United Kingdom
Elizabeth Burns (1957-2015) was Scottish poet of renown throughout the UK. This film of “Questions Regarding” illustrates one of several poems she wrote about the Solway coast. This huge estuary that lies between England and Scotland is an area rich in history, especially about its womenfolk. The poem recalls and gives recognition to past times when ordinary women used their natural skills to help and heal others in their community and through ignorance and social prejudice suffered horribly as a result. Feared as witches they were often falsely tried and condemned to an horrific death. Author Ali Smith described Elizabeth Burns' work as ". . . poetry of skill, sensuousness and something else, unnamed and untamed."
12) Things Are Moving Along (2m56s)
Directed by Billi London-Gray
Written by Billi London-Gray
Texas, United States Billi London-Gray's Website
This video presents an investigation of slightly crushed shoe forms paired with the sound of a mournful bell interrupted by a harsh engine and a voicemail recording. The bell tolling was recorded from a stranger's funeral procession during a period of personal mourning for the poet. The voicemail is the only recording she has of her grandmother’s voice. In the voicemail, the grandmother speaks about being displaced into assisted living against her will about seven months before her death. The shoes in the video are scans of the shoes the poet wore to her funeral. After the service, relatives spoke about her generosity and faithfulness, what she'd overcome as an immigrant child raised during the Great Depression, and the example she set for others. Photos showed her standing proudly beside Strom Thurmond.
13) Mauthausen: When the War Is Over (5m48s)
Directed by Panagiotis Kountouras , Aristarchos Papadaniel
Written by Iakovos Kambanellis, Aristarchos Papadaniel
Greece
“Mauthausen” is a lyric dream fantasy which visualizes Iakovos Kambanellis’ poetic testimony from his personal experience as a prisoner at the concentration and extermination camp. The new MAUTHAUSEN recording (voice-cello) is the last official release that was published with the permission of the world-renowned Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis ("Z", "Zorba the Greek", "Serpico", etc.) just one month before his passing on September 02, 2021.
14) Stitch (2m40s)
Directed by Caroline Rumley
Written by Caroline Rumley
United States Caroline Rumley's Website
On May 26, 2019, in Vienna, unknown vandals slashed large-scale fabric portraits of Holocaust survivors that we part of Luigi Toscano’s public arts project, Lest We Forget.
It's not what happened first; it's what happened next.
15) The Moon Appears (3m37s)
Directed by Jelle Meys
Written by Federico García Lorca
Belgium
An animated interpretation of the mysterious poem "La luna asoma (The moon appears)" by the Spanish poet Federico García Lorca.
At the rise of the moon
bells fade out
and impassable paths
appear….
PLAN YOUR VISIT
Arts + Literature Laboratory is located at 111 S. Livingston Street #100, Madison, Wisconsin, 53703.
Our galleries are normally open Tuesday through Friday 10am-5pm and Saturday noon to 5pm, and other programs take place throughout the week. Please check the events calendar and education section for details.
