~ Filmmaker: Marc Neys ~
The End or the Beginning by Jan Lauwereyns
The origin of this recent videopoem, Diving into Broken Bits (The End or the Beginning) by Marc Neys (A.K.A. Swoon), is a little complicated, so I’ll just quote his blog post about it:
A while back I made a video for ‘Het einde of het begin van een mensenleven / The end or the beginning of a human life’
This poem by Jan Lauwereyns (you can read about the videopoem) has an extended English version (published in the book ‘Three Poems To the Question of Four. 27+3 Drawings’)
Because they were so obviously connected I wanted to create a second video for the English poem; ‘The End or the Beginning’I asked Michael Dickes to read/record the poem and he delivered a perfect (dark blue with bits of fading grey) reading. I created a very slow and deep track around that recording […]
This time I didn’t want to use IICADOM footage. No family memories. The video needed to be more abstract.
The first thing I wanted to use was an experimental performance/recording by Ephemeral Rift.
The mask and movements in this short video reminded me of bunraku. It was the perfect link to Jan’s frame of mind.
(Jan lives and works as a scientist in Japan)
This video was going to be the lead in my videopoem. I added a variety of images around this storyline. Hints of science, nature, death,…
A poetic storyline through images. It’s a flow of thoughts surrounding the poem, being a flow on itself…I am very happy with this one, so was Jan. We started a journey together with this project. It will take us to other places, new ways of combining, crossing borders. More to follow in the future…
Strawberry Moon by Erica Goss
My fingers find the grit
of your chin
like the seed-crowded
tips of strawberries
we stole and ate
in darkness…
This is the 6th installment in the 12 Moons videopoetry series presented by Atticus Review each month in 2014, featuring Erica Goss (text), Nic S. (voiceover), Kathy McTavish (music) and Marc Neys, A.K.A. Swoon (concept, music and direction). Neys shared some process notes on his blog:
A lush short poem that I wanted to give an extra dark layer by adding a bit of ‘danger’.
I went back to the public domain feature Dementia 13 for the footage.
A nightly rendez-vous with a lot of staring between the two characters.
Leaving the story open and full of questions…I started to work with certain parts of that footage.
Once I had a basic montage, I awaited Nic’s reading to work on a soundscape with musical blocks provided by Kathy.
Stimuli by Helen Vitoria
A poem by Helen Vitoria at the Poetry Storehouse gets the Swoon treatment. Marc Neys writes,
As long as The Poetry Storehouse stock keeps growing with more and interesting poems and writers, I’ll keep coming back.
For this work I picked out a poem by Helen Vitoria. I worked with Helen before a few years back and I love her choice of words. Pure and rich.[…]
Those who have been watching my last series of videos know that I’m a fan of the ‘home movies’ that are collected
at IICADOM. It’s such a rich and beautiful collection. To be able to take a peek in all those lives… Create your own stories… I truly enjoy that.
For this poem I wanted footage from a wedding.
Young people in love on the beginning of their journey.
A lot of wedding footage on IICADOM, but this stood out (for me) Beautiful B/W, brutal cuts. Faces full of joy and hope.I thought these images would make a great pairing with Helen’s poem.
Two Miles After the Gravel Road Ends by Sherry O’Keefe
This video based on a poem by Sherry O’Keefe uses public-domain footage shot in South Dakota in the late 1930s, as Marc Neys (Swoon) explains:
Promises are there to be broken (the ones I make to myself, that is)
I’ve said never to use the footage of Ivan Besse again. I didn’t.
Not until I came across ‘Two Miles After the Gravel Road Ends’ by Sherry O’Keefe in The Poetry Storehouse.
Sherry was one of the poets I did a video for in ‘my early days’. A videopoem and a collab that is still dear to my heart.
It was a pleasure to find her words on the shelves of the warehouse. Such beautiful words.A lot of her poems tell stories. Great chunks of life wrapped in words and images. And these were just a perfect match for the storytelling images of Ivan Besse.
Flower Moon by Erica Goss
Part 5 in the 12 Moons videopoem series from Atticus Review, and the first I think I’ve managed to post on the full moon. Credits are as usual: text by Erica Goss, recitation by Nic S., music by Kathy McTavish, and concept, music and direction by Marc Neys (Swoon). I thought I recognized some of the footage in this one, and a visit to Marc’s blog confirms it: I was present when he did the filming last August, during the first Filmpoem Festival in Dunbar, Scotland. Here’s what he says:
“Flower Moon,” where Erica Goss explores the privilege and burden of her name and all of its meanings.
A name afraid of loss.
A name the color of soil.
A name that sounds like
three small cars colliding.
These lines steered me in the direction of the footage used in this video.I started to work with certain parts of that footage (shot last summer in Dunbar).
Once I had a basic montage, I awaited Nic’s reading to work on a soundscape with musical blocks provided by Kathy.I said it before and I will say it again. Cooking’s fun and easy when you have great ingredients.
(If) Grief (were) Briefly (to) Disappear by Stevie Ronnie
This new collaboration between filmmaker Marc Neys (Swoon) and poet Stevie Ronnie is the result of a unique writing contest at Awkword Paper Cut, which challenged submitters to write a new poem (or re-purpose an old one) in response to footage that Neys provided. Ronnie’s winning poem was one of seven finalists chosen by a distinguished panel of seven judges. The contest results page includes some process notes from Neys:
Footage: The woman in the video is my mother, holding a bust made by my sister of my dead father. Originally, the footage was shot for a video about ‘Roots’ (Heimat). I had made shots of my mother in places that were significant in my youth – our old driveway, my favorite forest, the place I secretly smoked my first cigarette, my first school, etc.
Soundscape: It’s a re-edit of a scape I made inspired after reading James Salter’s All That Is, about an older man looking back on his life and (lost) loves.
There’s also a full-length interview with the poet. Here’s a snippet:
The words were written in direct response to Swoon’s video. I watched it several times without writing anything down at all and then lines began to appear. The poem went through several iterations before falling into its final form. My approach is such that I tend to write without putting too much thought into the intended result but it did feel important to start with the video. I was also conscious of the need to avoid being overly descriptive; to leave some slack between the video and the text for the viewer’s imagination to slip into. I can see the advantages of starting with the images and soundtrack and I’d be keen to work in this way again. I think starting with the video forces me to let go of some of the control that I would usually have when writing a poem. Because I could sense the emotional weight that the video would bring to the final piece I was layering onto that as opposed to inventing the entire world of the poem with my words alone.
Congratulations to Stevie Ronnie, to the other finalists — and to Awkword Paper Cut for a successful and well-executed outcome to this innovative contest.
Bees in the Eaves by Bill Yarrow
Bill Yarrow’s poem “Bees in the Eaves” has had many lives. It originally appeared in Mad Hatters’ Review along with audio of the author’s reading, was reprinted in his collection Pointed Sentences (BlazeVOX 2012), and was reprinted again at The Poetry Storehouse, where it garnered a reading by Nic S. and this video remix by Marc Neys, A.K.A. Swoon. Coming back full-circle to the mad hatters, perhaps, the video uses footage from the 1940 documentary Symptoms Of Schizophrenia, via the Prelinger Archives. Marc notes:
There was a track ‘Tsukuru Swims‘ I had just finished that was right for Nic S.’s reading of the poem.
It took a bit of re-editing but the combination worked beautifully […]The lines ‘There’s a remedy for everything. And a remedy for every remedy.’ made me think of a short and uncomfortable docu I saw on Prelinger last year.
I took out the footage I thought was disturbing and confronting and edited it to the rhythm and the noises in the soundtrack. I layered the result with moving lights, shot from a train, to give it an extra edge and some depth.
Bill Yarrow spoke of his experience with Poetry Storehouse remixes in an interview at the Moving Poems forum back in March (prior to the release of this video).
Counting by Steve Klepetar
Steve Klepetar’s poem from The Poetry Storehouse gets the Swoon treatment. Marc Neys writes,
I wanted a more experimental (frantic even) sequence of images for this one. I constructed a soundtrack around Steve’s reading. Re-edited sounds I created before, a sample from I.M. Rawes, taken from London Sound Survey, and new addings of heavily treated recordings (a boiler room) […]
I found the perfect images and atmosphere in one of the hundreds of excerpts out of “The International Institute for the Conservation, Archiving and Distribution of Other People’s Memories” on IICADOM.
A weird combination of naive stop motion (with clay, hands and beans) with some alienated dancing and dark faces in between… A strange string of associations, perfect for what I had in mind.
Steve Klepetar’s home page has some links to his poetry collections (scroll down). And of course check out the rest of his stuff at The Poetry Storehouse.
Planter’s Moon by Erica Goss
With all the excitement on social media about last night’s eclipse, I thought I’d jump on the lunar bandwagon and share the 4th installment of 12 Moons, the collaborative videopoetry project from Erica Goss (text), Nic S. (voice), Kathy McTavish (music) and Marc Neys, A.K.A. Swoon (music, concept, camera, and direction) for Atticus Review. This one uses footage from The Plow that Broke the Plains, Pare Lorentz’ poetic documentary about the Dust Bowl, which, I suggested here last year, may be seen as a sort of epic filmpoem in its own right. Marc says in his process notes:
First time I read the poem (before there was a reading or a soundtrack) I thought of this fantastic documentary by Pare Lorentz.
I started to work with certain parts of the film (treated them, gave them a colour) and tried to put them in a split screen.
Once I had a basic montage, I awaited Nic’s reading to work on a soundscape with musical blocks provided by Kathy.I said it before and I will say it again. Cooking’s fun and easy when you have great ingredients. All the pieces fitted perfectly and lifted each other to a higher plane. I only had to do a small re-edit of my basic montage once the soundtrack was made.
Sundowning by Matt Mullins
A collaboration between Marc Neys and Matt Mullins, who writes:
Alzheimer’s/Dementia includes a phase called sundowning during which the afflicted cannot shake the sense that there is somewhere else they must be, regardless of where they are. This includes the need to go “home” even if one is already home. The videopoem comments on this condition even as it comments on how Alzheimer’s/Dementia takes the sufferer “away” from loved ones while that loved one is still in their presence.
Editing original footage/Music: Swoon (Marc Neys)
Direction/Poem/Recitation/Audio-Visual Composition: Matt Mullins
Worm Moon by Erica Goss
This is Part III of 12 Moons, the collaborative videopoetry project from Erica Goss (text), Nic S. (voice), Kathy McTavish (music) and Marc Neys, A.K.A. Swoon (music, concept, camera, and direction) for Atticus Review:
12 Moons is an artwork combining poetry, voice, music and video. Twelve poems written by Erica Goss form the narrative. The poems move through a year of full moons, reflecting the hidden influence of the moon on one person’s life. Kathy McTavish’s original music adds complexity to Nic S.’s intense and compelling narration, framed by Swoon’s precise editing of sound and image, which creates a miniature universe for each poem within the context of the project.
Marc writes:
It’s a fun, yet slightly mysterious poem. I wanted simple footage, bright colours and ‘wormlike’ movement and I found some (shadows shot while hiking).
Just as with the first 2, I wanted the ending to turn away from the visual storyline.Fun news about the project; Erica Goss and I will present the whole project (all 12) during an artist talk at the Zebra Poetry Film Festival in Berlin later this year.
Spiegel / Mirror by Sylvia Plath
Plath’s poem, translated into Dutch by Lucienne Stassaert, is read by Swoon (Marc Neys) as part of the soundtrack for this impressionistic new film (for which he has helpfully also supplied English subtitling). “It’s dark, anything but clear (like a mirror), full of fleeting spirits,” he writes.
Marc seems to be going through an unusually productive period right now, so I may be posting two Swoon videopoems a week until I catch up.
