The actor who is in the clips is my friend Corey McMahon. Thanks Corey!
This visual poetry experiment is my study of integration between 2 or more different media art forms. It’s nothing new from the point of view of the execution and result, but I would like to offer different viewpoint.
Going back a little bit as a background information, I just want to say that I love literature in any forms – (No, please don’t ask me what recent fiction/literature book I read. I haven’t got the time to read at the moment and the next long holiday is still far off the horizon. I tell you, as much as I want to revisit Vidal’s work, they are still on the book shelf – and I feel guilty about it).
But one thing is for sure, I like a lot of Beat Generation writers works such as Michael McClure, and Allen Ginsberg. I recently listen again to William S. Burroughs’ work “Dead City Radio” - brilliant!brilliant! brilliant! – It’s always a moving experienced every time I listen to it. I read Jack Kerouac too. Not to forget to mention my all time favourite: essayist and poet Goenawan Mohammad.
The power of language and words are extraordinary for me. Reciting poems can generate different images in my brain and sometimes can give me goose bumps. Most of the time I think that it would be wonderful being able to see poetry in images.
I understand that some literature purist might argue that it breaks the mystery of the words. My answer is exactly the same as the situation where a literature work from one language is translated into another or a novel was transformed into film. I think in a simple words, and in my defence, I just want to say that taking the emotion of a work of literature into visual imagery invokes and strengthens the perception of the meaning (of the works) - therefore I call works I create with this kind of approach visual poetry.
So, from this foundation of thinking, I want to explore:
- What if (written) poetry manifests visually of its word(s) into its own body of word(s),
- What if the realization of the effects interacts with live performers or performance, and
- What if the performances are interpreted back into the words to its own literal meaning?
Even Translation Effort Also Suffers The Problem.
Every writer that I like usually has a general theme of their works. McClure’s thesis concluded that the general theme of the works of my favourite poet/singer Jim Morrison are about death and water.
I would say that for my favourite Indonesian poet, Sapardi Djoko Damono – the theme is about blood and rain. The metaphor of rain always transcends romantically and emotionally when he is talking about his longing of the motherland, love and lover, faith and beliefs, or any social commentary.
Most of his work has been translated into English, but, frankly I prefer the Indonesian version. But judge yourself, which one is the best. Here’s one of my favourites:
Kami Bertiga
dalam kamar ini kami bertiga:
aku, pisau, dan kata –
kalian tahu, pisau barulah pisau kalau ada darah di matanya
tak peduli darahku atau darah kata
( Sapardi Djoko Damono, 1982)
Here’s my translation:
The Three Of Us
The three of us are in this room:
me, the dagger, and the words –
you know, it IS a dagger if there is blood in it
no matter it’s my blood or the word’s blood
And here’s John H McGlynn’s translation.
The Three Of Us
In this room, the three of us:
I, the knife and the word –
You know, the knife is only a knife when blood is on its blade
No matter if it’s my blood or that of the word
( John McGlynn, Sapardi Djoko Damono, Suddenly The Night, 1988)
To test my idea, I came up with the prototype in the clips above. I put some gibberish words to represent the poetry to enhance the idea as well. The first clip shows the first possibility: you will see the words falling down from sky resemble rain. The second clip shows the poetry generating a type of tornado. It starts falling from the sky and then spins around the performer (object).
From these two little experiments, the movement can be varied depending on the emotion or gesture, like, fading, exploding, twirling – endless possibilities.
I would also emphasise that, as a body of work, the use of this idea will not be limited to cross-media art only between literature (poetry) and media art, but it can be used in performing arts or theatre. I am also thinking about a moment – a moment when this technique can be used for performance art – what if the audience was able to physically touch the words? That would be magical!
My further thinking leads me to explore the ideas as follows:
- Since the words in the clips are produced dynamically via programming, what if in performance the poetry was dynamically produced in a live situation (not from pre-rendered results like in the clips). So, the writer or operator or actor is responsible for the interactivity.
- The possibility of using voice/speech recognition software to interpret the voice/speech into the words and generate the result into the live performance.
- The possibility of using free live data sources via a high speed internet connection. (That also can be used as an option for national/international art collaboration).
So that’s the idea of my visual poetry. Feel free to post any comment or interest.