Sad Parrot- a video for my thesis

more bird videos to come, including Katy Becker as a pigeon.

dance anywhere 2010

For me, dance and poetry are very closely linked.  A dance is a poem is a dance is a poem. Like that.  

Anyway, March 26th was annual Dance Anywhere day.  I signed up about a month ago, and will give this footage to the artist who coordinates the day.  I did it last year with my friend Katy Becker( www.youtube.com/katyannebecker4you ).  It always happens at noon California time. This year at noon, I was mid-route to Lake Tahoe with my whole family.  We pulled over to a gas station and i found a grassy knol on which to rock out with my son Elliott and my sister Kacie.  The only background music is the weird noises Kacie and Elliott are making.

So, this is me participating is someone else's public art project.

new video poem: passion/less

this video poem is different from any other video i've made in that i am using footage from several different days, and old footage.  my usual process involves filming and editing all in the same day or two, whereas the bulk of this footage is from november 4th, 2009.

as with much of my work, this video poem is, in part, an exploration of my relationship with my body, my connection to my home/s and spaces around me.  I am really interested in the idea of homes, bodies, and bodies as home.  If someone invades your body, they invade your home, and how does that affect how you relate to your home?

Anyway, here is the video.

brenna

poetry in video: i did not consent to this

This video is in response to a poem I wrote the other day, called "Yea well, it's dry".  The video takes it's name from a video clip i found of myself saying that line.

 

words words words words words words words words words words words

plan for today/ the week

Last night my son reminded me of one of my ideas for a project-  to paint/stencil a poem on a very large canvas or board and ask stores to display it in their window for a day, or a few hours even.  I envision the fabric store on Piedmont Ave to be very nice to me.  Thank god for elliott's weird selective listening/memory, or i would have totally forgotten about this one.  

Today: Making and using a potato stamp to print "words" all over my torso and arms, then photographing my body.

Plan for the rest of the week:  

-begin to print out words for magnetic poetry, and glue to sheets of magnet i found at creative re-use.  still haven't figured out what magnetic surface i will use.  a large white board?  maybe mills has one i can borrow.

-Think of what poem I'd like to use for the sheet over the 580.

accomplished: poetry in dorms

i just got home from a walk in the rain after slipping a poem under the door/in the door of every resident in Ethel Moore Hall.  Hopefully.  that place is a maze with three floors, like half-floors, and windy curvy craziness. so, i may have missed a few people.  but, i gave away 82 copies of my poem, "in books."  here are some (completely backwards order because i dont quite get blogger yet )photos from the process:

"for you"

this is Ethel Moore.

thanks to Cornelia Nixon, my thesis instructor, who sat down in the middle of Mills Hall and folded poems with me.

Here is the poem:

In books

February 22, 2010

 

Poetry in books

Small things in nooks

Feathers in the sky

Birds fly through

Wind sifting by

 

Small

Brave and thin

sparkling in

Through scents of morning meals

And the turning of wheels

Tiny scraps of metal

Little specs of dirt

Interesting faces

 

Tiny little spaces

Tiny words

Tiny hearts, big words

Spread across a banner like a table cloth

Here is my heart

She gives it away to strangers

Poetry in books

Poetry in you hand

My heart.

resturant poetry #2

after getting chinese food with Lauren:

The meal was stressful because elliott was running wild and Lauren and I both had headaches.  i wasn't in the mood to write a poem for the waiter:

resturant poetry #1

Orinda Village Cafe, after lunch with my parents and son:

current plan for this week:

-complete poems slipped under the doors in ethel moore dorm, aka "poetry in dorms" 

-continue planning for other projects

steps, tasks, materials to get for "poetry in dorms":

-buy 82 envelopes at Creative Re-Use (will not all be the same, will be cheap)

-print out 82 copies of poem, "in books"

-photograph process

-slip envelopes under doors around 5pm on Wednesday or Thursday

Thesis blog?

This blog will document the progress of my Senior Thesis in Poetry for Mills College.  The project component, a series of art projects,  will go along with my written thesis in poetry.

Preliminary list of projects:

-poems in envelopes under every door in Ethel Moore dorm

-words written all over my body and photographed

-large-scale magnetic poetry with public access

-poems on t-shirts

-dance/music videos as poetry

-poem on a bed sheet hung from an over pass on the 580 freeway

-poems on back of receipts at resturants

More information to come.