2024 Midwest Video Poetry Fest Night 1 | Arts + Literature Laboratory | Madison Contemporary Arts Center

2024 Midwest Video Poetry Fest Night 1

Join us for the 5th annual Midwest Video Poetry Fest on Saturday, October 5, 2024 and Saturday, October 12, 2024 at 7 PM for live reading and video collaborations followed by a screening of the best new poetry videos from around the world. These films include original poems, experimental works, animation, translations, and more. Filmmakers, poets, and festival organizers will be on hand for a short Q&A after the screening.

Tonight's live video poetry collaboration is by Erika Meitner and Michelle Kelley. 

This event will be held live at ALL in Madison. Seating is limited.

Midwest Video Poetry Fest 2024 is funded in part by a grant from Wisconsin Humanities, with funds from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Wisconsin Humanities strengthens our democracy through educational and cultural programs that build connections and understanding among people of all backgrounds and beliefs throughout the state. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this project do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities. 

Woman in black sitting in a concrete shell with bullets littered on the floor in front of her

1) Broken Arabic (3m38s)
Directed by Amal Kassir
Written by Amal Kassir
Colorado, United States
Amal Kassir

A poem for the diaspora child, who could never grieve in the language of the homeland, but tries anyway.

Figure dancing on a roof crowded with towers and equipment against a city skyline

2) Exiles (4m33s)
Directed by Josef Khallouf
Written by Corinne Boulad

Lebanon

Shot in Beirut, “Exiles” is a conversation with ourselves when the ground slips away beneath our feet, a forced journey and a dreamlike vision of a home-island—an asylum torn from chaos—to which we cling. For those who do not have the privilege to choose and those who bleed for having left.

3) No Words (5m00s)
Directed by Mariam Al-Dhubhani
Written by Ahmed Abdul Raqeeb Alkhulaidi
Yemen

‘"No Words” is a lyrical film that laments the poet's loss of words as to what is happening to his beloved city Taiz and the conflict in Yemen. It utilizes 360-degree footage to place the audience at the camera's point of view as an observer to what is occurring in the city.

a large cat face made out of colorful popsicle sticks and a child lying beside it with his arms behind his head

4) Silencio gris (Grey Silence) (4m06s)
Directed by Charles Olsen, Lilián Pallares
Written by Gissel Orellana
Spain
Our Little Roses

A collaborative poetry film featuring girls of the orphanage made during the Our Little Roses Poetry Fellowship with Lilián Pallares and Charles Olsen in San Pedro Sulas, Honduras.

young man in front of a mural of Jesus with a crown of thorns

5) Savior (3m51s)
Directed by Ray Santisteban
Written by Marcial Delgado
North Carolina, United States

Featuring acclaimed Albuquerque, New Mexico poet Marcial Delgado, “Savior” is call to action, a cry for help, and ultimately a harsh indictment of U.S. Immigration policy. Part op-ed, part confrontational oratory, Delgado speaks his truth to a society that routinely vilifies immigrants.

a woman holding our her arms in front of a mirror in an orange room with a man measuring her

6) Reparaciones (2m15s)
Directed by Y(E)S
Written by Lorena Alvarado
California, United States
Sharim Studio

The poetry and images of Reparaciones invoke a cycle of the doing and undoing of fabrics and flesh, material and social, the threads that clothe our bodies and the relations that sustain our life.

young woman lying in purple flowers looking at self in mirror

7) Impermanence (5m38s)
Directed by Gabriella Maria Cisneros
Written by
Wisconsin, United States

A documentation by Mexican-American Milwaukee filmmaker Cisneros of the endless searching for someone who's no longer there. And a reflection on how early loss affects someone later in life. For and about motherless daughters.

woman with long hair standing in front of trees with her face obscured by a large black Polaroid camera

8) Bless Your Little Heart (2m47s)
Directed by
Written by Isa Ebrahimi
California, United States

This spoken-word experimental film using family and archival footage blurs the line between young girlhood and sexual objectification in low-class America.

woman swimming on her back with the words "no reason" across the image

9) synch : swim (1m36s)
Directed by
Written by Rana San
Turkey

A deconstructed how-to haiku for staying afloat through the endurance sport of life, featuring "Polycalia Myrtifolia" from album "Seeds" by Pablo Schvarzman.

drawing of an eagle in the bare branches of a real tree against a blue sky

10) Take a St. And (2m27s)
Directed by Semi Chan
Written by Semi Chan, Sabrina Fong, Vincent Sam, Rebecca Wong
Canada

Communities in St. George—where the loss of these streams has not only destroyed the homes of salmon, but the native trees and plants that are originally found on the land—unite to revive their neighborhoods.

a smiling woman in glasses holding large flowers in front of trees

11) You City, You Boyfriend (3m57s)
Directed by Maureen O'Connell
Written by Chandrika Narayanan Mohan
Ireland
3 Hot Whiskeys Films

A bad date leads a woman to discover the beauty of living in a city she loves. 

face of a statue of Simon Fraser with white lines drawn over his eyes and the words "your immortalized gaze" below

12) Ad Hominem (3m30s)
Directed by Brent Waldbillig
Written by Chantal Gibson
Canada

Examining the public monuments that immortalize Canadian “explorer” Simon Fraser, the narrator is haunted by his colonial legacy everywhere they go.

man leaning over to get something from a lower shelf in the aisle of a grocery store

13) the apple and the tree (3m40s)
Directed by Andja Arnebäck, Sara Garib
Written by Sara Garib
Sweden
Amary Film website

A poet and a grocer in Sweden talk about sacrifices and what it’s like when family life and work life are woven together.

Poet CAConrad writing on poem taped to a graffitied wall

14) Golden in the Morning Crane Our Necks (1m55s)
Directed by Matthew Thompson
Written by CAConrad
New York, United States

Former US Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith said, "CAConrad's poems invite the reader to become an agent in a joint act of recovery….” This video shows why CAConrad is your favorite poet’s favorite poet.

PLAN YOUR VISIT

Arts + Literature Laboratory is located at 111 S. Livingston Street #100, Madison, Wisconsin, 53703.

Our galleries are 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.

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