~ festivals and other screening events ~
News about any and all events in which poetry films/videos are prominently featured, whether or not they include an open competition. Please let us know about any we might miss. And don’t forget to check out our page of links to poetry film festivals. All festivals, events and calls for work are mentioned by MovingPoems with our best efforts and in good faith. However, do check all details yourself as we cannot guarantee accuracy, and make your own judgements because we cannot verify the things that we share. Events may fail for a variety of genuine reasons, or may be a scam to elicit fees.
Film and Video Poetry Symposium, Weimar Poetry Film Prize announce winners
Back at the end of April, the Film and Video Poetry Society website had a post announcing the winning films coming out of their inaugural symposium, presented in image form, with no accompanying text. They were:
Best Choreopoem
Moving Southwark (director & poet Jevan Chowdhury, U.K., 2016)
Outstanding Poem
Oceanik (director Lucia Sellars, poet Nia Davies, U.K., 2017)
Best Film Essay
Where Is Eva Hipsey? (director Orla McHardy, writer Justin Spooner, U.S., 2016)
Best Experimental film
Phantom Cinema (writer & director Cheng Li-Ming, Taiwan, 2016)
Best Videopoem
Dog Daze (director & poet Ian Gibbins, Australia, 2017)
(Details grabbed from their previously published shortlist.)
*
Earlier this week, the 2018 Weimar Poetry Film Prizes were announced on the Poetryfilmkanal website, in German. Here’s how Google translates the first part of the post:
The winners of the third Weimar Poetry Film Awards are the films THE DESKTOP METAPHOR (jury prize) and PATATA DAY (Audience Award). The jury also awarded a special mention to the film BLUE FLASH FLASH.
JURY PRIZE
The jury of the third Weimar Poetry Film Award, consisting of the Thuringian poet Daniela Danz, the artist and curator Cathy De Haan from Leipzig and the Norwegian animator Kristian Pedersen, chose the English entry THE DESKTOP METAPHOR (2017) as the winner of the €1000 jury prize. Directed by the Dutch director Helmie Stil; the underlying poem was written by the British author Caleb Parkin.
Google makes a hash of the jury statement, but here’s the film:
And here’s the winner of the jury’s Special Mention, Blue Flash Flash by Jane Glennie:
The Poetryfilmkanal post also includes a trailer for the winner of the audience award, but that’s their own upload, so you’ll have to click through to watch it.
Don’t miss the illustrated and annotated (in German and English) shortlist. These were a bunch of really strong films.
A belated but nonetheless heart-felt congratulations to all the winners!
Call for work: 6th annual Ó Bhéal International Poetry-Film Competition
Just received this communication from the Ó Bhéal International Poetry-Film Competition.
2018 is Ó Bhéal’s ninth year screening International poetry-films, and sixth year featuring this competition. Up to thirty films will be shortlisted and screened during the festival in October. One winner will receive the IndieCork/Ó Bhéal prize for best Poetry-Film.
The festival takes place between the dates of the 7th and the 14th October, 2018.
Entry is free to anyone, and should be made via email to poetryfilm [at] obheal.ie – including the following info in an attached Word document:
- Name and duration of Film
- Name of director
- Country of origin
- Contact details
- Name of Poet
- Name of Poem
- Synopsis
- Filmmaker biography
- and a Link to download a high-resolution version of the film.
You may submit as many entries as you like. Films must interpret, or convey a poem which must be present in its entirety, having been completed no earlier than August 2016. They may not exceed 10 minutes in duration. Non-English language films will require English subtitles. The final shortlist will be announced during September.
Shortlisted films also appear in Ó Bhéal’s poetry-film touring programme, at a number of film and literary festivals, to date including the Clare Island Film Festival, Belfast Film Festival, Stanzas in Limerick, the Cyclops festival in Kiev, Poemaria in Vigo and at the Madeira Literary Festival (2018). Shortlisted entries are also screened throughout the year from Ó Bhéal’s competition shortlist archive (in random), at the start of each Ó Bhéal poetry evening.
This year’s entries are judged by poet Oonagh Kearney and filmmaker Anamaria Crowe Serrano.
The submission deadline is August 15th, 2018.
Juteback Poetry Film Festival 2018 is open for submissions
The Fort Collins, Colorado-based poetry film festival formerly known as Body Electric Poetry Film Fest is planning a 2018 festival.
Poetry and filmmaking converge for this unique, one night only event. Featuring films from around the globe, the Juteback Poetry Film Festival highlights the creative migration of two art forms, video & poetry, also known as Videopoetry. JPFF is Colorado’s only poetry film festival and one of only two screening in the U.S. today. Join us on Friday October 19th at Wolverine Farm Publishing’s Letterpress and Publick House, 316 Willow St, @ 7:30 in Fort Collins CO. for Juteback Poetry Film Festival 2018
And they’re open for submissions:
THE JUTEBACK POETRY FILM FESTIVAL SUBMISSION GUIDE
- All films must be submitted online. Please use the form below to complete your submission. To submit please load your film to Youtube, Vimeo or media sharing site of your choice, then provide the link in your submission. If you choose to use a privacy setting on either Youtube or Vimeo please be sure to provide us with a proper access code to view your film.
- All films must be completed before the deadline of Aug. 19th, 2018. As long as your film has been completed before the Aug. 19th deadline please feel free to submit.
- All non-English films must have English sub-titles.
- All films selected for the festival grant Juteback Productions, LLC the rights to use all video images and press materials from the film for promotional purposes.
- Juteback Productions, LLC is permitted to retain copies of each film selected as part of our festival library and for media educational use.
- You may submit more than one film, please repeat process for each entry.
- Films must be no more than 15 minutes in duration.
Call for entries: Silk Road International Poetry Film Festival
A new-to-me poetry film festival in Kazakhstan is soliciting poetry films and videos for the second year in a row. The Silk Road International Poetry Film Festival has a Facebook page, but the main English-language site for their 2018 festival is this page on sway.com.
II International Poetry Film Festival Silk Road will be held on June 21, 2018. The festival will be conducted within the frameworks of the Almaty International Literary Biennale in the National Library of the Republic of Kazakhstan (Almaty).
Honorary chairman of the Festival Jury – a legendary, world famous poet, literary critic, diplomat, political and public figure, linguist and scientist Olzhas Suleimenov.
The purpose of the festival:
Poetry Film Festival Silk Road is a cultural and educational, nonprofit project. In the era of social media and technology people tend to read less, especially poetry. The purpose of the festival is to popularize the invaluable legacy of the poets of the East, Kazakhstan, Central Asia, and other regions among youth through visualization of the poetry by presenting it in forms of short movies and video illustrations.
Extensive research of poems for film adaptations provides the participants with an opportunity to get acquainted with poetic works of authors of different eras, cultures, and world outlook.
The festival seeks to create an intellectual platform for the exchange of ideas for the adaptation of screen versions, for identification of new poets, for cultural exchange between participants from different countries. The same functions in time fulfilled the Great Silk Road.
All the works of the participants will be posted in the public domains for familiarization and voting (one of the Prizes – Audience Choice Award).
Participation in Film Festival:
Everyone can take part. We give full freedom of self-expression. The participation is free.
Everything that’s needed:
1. It is encouraged to use poems of the Middle Eastern, East Asian and Central Asian poets (but you can use poems of any poet from any region) of any epoch and create a short film in any genre;
2. You can shoot your film with any smartphone, video camera or photo camera;
3. Film duration from 1 to 10 minutes;
4. Your film should be presented in English, Kazakh or Russian. If you use other languages, please add subtitles in one of the listed languages;
5. Post a video on youtube, vimeo or instagram (if your full video lasts up to 1 minute) with the hashtag #silkroadfestival2018 and send us a link, full name and phone number by May 15, 2018 to silkroadfestival@mail.ru
Citizenship, country of residence and the age of participants does not matter.
Prizes:
Prizes include the Grand Prix for the Best Poetry Film, Special Prize from festival’s sponsor and the Audience Choice Award. All participants will receive memorable certificates and festival laurels.
The finalists will be invited to a formal announcement of results and will be awarded the prizes on June 21 in the National Library in Almaty and International Literary Biennale. Some of the Biennale guests will include famous writers, poets, screenwriters and
playwrights from different countries.Finalist films will be shown for the jury and guests of the exhibition. Screenings will take place in the cinema of the National Library of the Republic of Kazakhstan and other sites of Almaty and Astana.
Click through for information about last year’s festival and finalists.
The Film and Video Poetry Society releases its 2018 symposium selections
The Los Angeles-based Film and Video Poetry Society, while remaining a bit of a cipher where its leadership and membership is concerned, does appear to be going ahead with the planned symposium on April 26-29. Despite the $18 submission fee, they seem to have had no shortage of submissions, because their just-released list of selections is not short:
The 2018 Film and Video Poetry Symposium, presented by the Film and Video Poetry Society, has announced its official program selections for the inaugural edition of The Film and Video Poetry Symposium. The Film and Video Poetry Symposium celebrates artistic excellence found through the union of poetry, film, video, and new media. The symposium brings together cinema enthusiasts, poets, filmmakers, video artists, and media artists to discover international work that represents this dynamic field.
This year’s symposium will screen over eighty films representing filmmakers, poets, and artists from over twenty countries, along with workshops, guided panels, and conversations. The Film and Video Poetry Symposium runs from Thursday, April 26 – Sunday, April 29, 2018 in Los Angeles, Ca.
New Liberated Words website
Congratulations to Liberated Words—Sarah Tremlett and Lucy English’s videopoetry- and poetry film-promoting organization—for their brand new website overhaul. It is now much easier to navigate, not to mention better looking than its predecessor. According to a post on their Facebook page, it’s the work of Peter Hunter. He adapted a three-column WordPress magazine theme, with a top navigation bar menu of major post categories that collapses behind a three-line “hamburger” icon on mobile view. The site loads quickly on my slow internet connection.
I’m relieved to see this, because previously I think new content was being added to the front page by editing and re-publishing it, which made for an incoherent archive and provided no way to subscribe to new content. Now there’s an RSS feed and everything, so I won’t have to worry about missing new posts… such as this introduction of two new members of their team, Caleb Parkin and Ursula Billington, or this piece on their judging of poetry films for the upcoming Newlyn International Film Festival. Well done.
Doublebunny Press Opens Submissions for Fifth Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival
Doublebunny Press announced on Wednesday, February 28 that submissions were open for the fifth Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival.
The Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival is a competition meant to highlight poetry and visual art at the intersection of film. The festival, due to take place in Worcester, Massachusetts, USA in October of 2018, focuses on short films that illustrate original poems, all of which are non-performance based (read: no footage of the poems being performed).
As well as a $200 prize for Best Overall Production, Rabbit Heart will be awarding $100 prizes in six other categories: Best Animated, Best Music/Sound, Best Smartphone Production, Best Under 1 Minute, Best Valentine, and the Shoots! Youth Prize. The matinee, and then the gala awards ceremony and viewing party will be at Nick’s Bar in Worcester, MA on October 20th.
About Doublebunny Press
Doublebunny Press is a small, independent press that serves the New England area through poetry design, layout, and production of fine books and posters. Doublebunny also supported Omnivore Magazine, a poetry and arts monthly which, during its three-year run, published poetry and articles by over 150 authors, and carried a national subscription base.
Doublebunny has a history of great spoken word events in Worcester. They combined forces with The Worcester Poets’ Asylum to present V Day to the city in 2002 and 2003, and the Individual World Poetry Slam in 2005. In 2014, Doublebunny brought the inaugural Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival to the city, and now for the fifth year’s festival, they plan an even more exciting show for Worcester, inviting the imagination of poets and filmmakers to once again take center stage.
About Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival
Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival is one of very few outlets in the US for poetry on film, and the only festival that asks that the author of the poem participate in the making of the production. In 2014 and 2015 Rabbit Heart attracted international attention, including not only European submissions, but also the honor of a showcase in the CYCLOP festival in Ukraine and showings in Barcelona, Spain at pro.l.e. In 2017 Rabbit Heart was thrilled to present at the Mass Poetry Festival.
Submissions are now open for the 2018 Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival, and will remain open through July 1st.
To learn more about this event, please go to www.rabbitheartpoetry.com or to www.doublebunnypress.com, and then click on the menu link to Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival.
Call for videopoetry: Langue Festival della Poesia di San Lorenzo
A student-run poetry festival in the San Lorenzo quarter of Rome will include a videopoetry section, and they’re open for submissions. Langue – Festival della Poesia di San Lorenzo (Facebook page) will be held on May 26. From their call for participants:
Per la categoria Video Poetry, la durata dell’opera dovrà essere massimo di 25 minuti. Qualora il file fosse troppo pesante per una mail, inviaci il tuo lavoro tramite WeTransfer e noi penseremo al resto. Ricordati anche in quel caso di indicare la categoria nell’oggetto della mail.
(For the Video Poetry category, the duration of the work should be a maximum of 25 minutes. If the file is too heavy for an email, send us your work via WeTransfer and we’ll do the rest. Remember also in that case to indicate the category in the subject of the email.)
(Translation via Google.) There’s also a bit in English:
World Wide Poets
If you are not Italian, it doesn’t mean you cannot contribute to our festival. Indeed, you can send us your proposal (an unpublished collection of poems, for example) per mail (festival.langue@gmail.com), indicating if you already have a translation of your work in Italian or at least in English. You can contribute with everything you prefer: readings, video poetry, performances, and so on. The deadline is May 2
I asked the organizer, Giorgio Papitto, if they had preferred languages or file formats. He said they were happy to discuss these matters with submitters “and arrange what suits at the best for the author and for the festival. The language is not a problem, if there are subtitles (either in English or in Italian).”
Poetry film festival news round-up
Weimar Poetry Film Award extends deadline
If you thought you missed your chance to submit to the Weimarer Poetryfilmpreis (original deadline: January 31), you’re in luck: the new deadline is March 31. Here are the guidelines.
Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival open for 2018 submissions on February 28
I’ll share the full announcement next weekend, but for all you eager beavers, gird your loins!
Motionpoems Season 8 Premiere (take 2)
If you missed your chance to attend Motionpoems’ Season 8 premiere screening in New York on February 8 (which was sold out), you’re in luck: they’re holding a second Season 8 premiere in Minneapolis on April 13! You might’ve thought that “second premiere” is a logical impossibility, but that’s the magic of poetry film for you.
Motionpoems Season 8: Dear Mr. President is screening in Minneapolis! Two screenings will be held at 5:30 and 7:30 with a panel discussion in-between. Admission is free, but a $10-20 donation is encouraged to support Motionpoems Season 9. Beer and wine will be available.
Led by Executive Producer Claire McGirr, this year Motionpoems has decided to tackle issues that affect everyone.
Pairing filmmakers & poets to make creative content, Season 8 features 12 short films that tackle racism, LGBTQIA+ rights, immigration, women’s rights, gun control, educational & social welfare, judicial system reform, climate change, and news/media/social platforms.
Our poets include Tiana Clark, Natalie Diaz, Eve L. Ewing, Peter LaBerge, Robin Coste Lewis, Susannah Nevison, Danez Smith, Maggie Smith, Lee Ann Roripaugh, and Nomi Stone.
Their poems were adapted to film by directors Daniel Daly, Kate Dolan, Mohammed Hammad, Anais LaRocca, Savanah Leaf, Monty Marsh, Jane Morledge, Ty Richardson, Ryan Simon, Tom Speers, Jovan Todorovic and Tash Tung.
Light Up Poole winners and shortlist
The overall winner of this new UK competition was Kneading Language by Celia Parra Diaz. Here are the shortlist, the judge’s statement, and the winning film.
6th International Video Poetry Festival in Athens, 19-20 January: full program released
Plans have been finalized and a press release issued for the 6th International Video Poetry Festival in Athens. It will be held at the Embros self-organized theater next Friday and Saturday, and includes the work of 134 video artists, filmmakers and poets from 25 countries, five performances with 21 live poets, three DJs with four live concerts, two video installations AND a book fair! (Have you ever heard of a poetry film festival with a book fair before? Me neither, but what a great idea!)
Here’s the full, profusely illustrated press release, and I’ll paste in the most informative of their posters below. I realize this is kind of short notice for people to make travel plans, but obviously it’s hard to make long-range plans for major events happening in unofficial spaces vulnerable to state repression. I have yet to attend one of these myself, but I got a first-hand report from friends who attended last years’, and they said the screening was extremely well-attended and the audience diverse and seemingly rapt (though perhaps a little too fond of cigarette smoking). The point is there’s more than one way to organize a videopoetry or poetry film festival, and I think it’s important to pay attention to how they’re doing it in Athens. This sounds like a really dynamic, exciting event.
Film festival news note: Newlyn extends deadline to 21 February
The deadline for submissions to the Newlyn Film Festival has been extended to February 21st. (It had been January 31.) This is the festival slated for April 6-8th on the southwestern tip of England with a special category for poetry films, to be judged by Lucy English and Sarah Tremlett. The director tells me they’ve had a good response from poetry filmmakers so far, so I guess we’re not the main reason the deadline has been extended, but don’t miss your chance to be a part of this brand-new festival. Here are the guidelines.
Motionpoems Season 8 premiere set for February 8 in New York
The Minnesota-based, nonprofit poetry film production company Motionpoems will be premiering its new season of films in New York City for the first time this year. (Get your tickets here.) But that’s only one of the things that makes this sound so intriguing.
To start with, they’re calling Season 8 “Dear Mr. President.” And they’ve produced films for poems by some of the hippest and most popular poets in the U.S., with directors from around the world:
Led by executive producer Claire McGirr, Motionpoems decided to tackle issues that affect everyone.
The season features poems that tackle racism, LGBTQIA+ rights, immigration, women’s rights, gun control, educational & social welfare, judicial system reform, climate change, and news/media/social platforms.
Our poets include Tiana Clark, Natalie Diaz, Eve L. Ewing, Peter LaBerge, Robin Coste Lewis, Sussanah Nevison, Danez Smith, Maggie Smith,LeeAnn Roripaugh, and Nomi Stone.
Their poems were adapted to film by Dan Daly, Kate Dolan, Mohammad Hamad, Anais La Rocca, Savanah Leaf, Monty Marsh, Jane Morledge, Ty Richardson, Ryan Simon, Tom Speers, Jovan Todorovic, and Tash Tung.
These issues affect populations internationally. Therefore, our filmmakers are international too. Hailing from America, England, Ireland, Saudi Arabia, Australia & Serbia, among others, this year our Directors are an eclectic collective of visionaries & artists.
Click through to reserve seats. The premiere is at the Anthology Film Archives, 32 2nd Avenue (at 2nd Street), New York, NY, and I’m told seating is limited. Between this event, and the New York-based Visible Poetry Project set to debut its second season of films in March, is it possible that the east-coast establishment arbiters of American literary taste will finally start paying attention to poetry film? Well, probably not, but we can always dream.
