Motionpoems premiere screening of Best American Poetry 2011

The new season of Best American Poetry 2011 motionpoems will kick off October 25th with two free public screenings at 6pm and 8pm at Target Performance Hall, Open Book, 1011 Washington Ave S., Minneapolis. Special guest David Lehman will join Boss and Kassube to host. The event is sponsored by Minnesota Center for Book Arts, Loft Literary Center, Friends of the Hennepin County Library, The Twin Cities Film Society, Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library, and Rimon: The Minnesota Jewish Arts Council.

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Motionpoems, Inc., announces the October 25th premiere of a dozen short film adaptations of poems from Best American Poetry 2011 (Scribner), creating a free digital companion to “poetry’s most popular annual anthology” (PW). The films are intended for online sharing as well as big-screen distribution and traditional broadcast.

Each of the hi-def films is created by a different video artist commissioned by Motionpoems. The films will be released on a free monthly subscription basis at motionpoems.com beginning January 2012, and will also be available for sale on DVD. Featured poets include Best American Poetry series editor David Lehman, Erin Belieu, Matthew Dickman, Michael Dickman, K.A. Hays, Bob Hicock, Jane Hirshfield, L.S. Klatt, James Longenbach, Bridget Lowe, Eric Pankey, Mark Strand, David Wagoner, and Richard Wilbur.

Motionpoems, Inc., is a 3-year-old nonprofit poetry film initiative in Minneapolis, co-founded by producer Angella Kassube and poet Todd Boss. The mission is to broaden the audience for poetry by turning great contemporary poems into short films. Motionpoems is incubated by HDMG Post Audio & Effects in Eden Prairie, Minn., which lends talent, tech, and resources.

The initiative demonstrates a creative model for distribution of poetry as short-form digital content perfect for sharing in social networks—an urgent marketing concern as publishers increasingly compete digitally.

“Poetry has a reputation that makes people less likely to sample it,” says Boss. “But when a poem is presented in film, people can bypass their assumptions about poetry and adopt more fluid expectations.”

Motionpoems completed a $15,000 Kickstarter.com fundraising campaign in June, and received its first grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board this year. Motionpoems has plans to expand its capacity and reach, with major publishing, education, distribution, and library partnerships in the works. “Best American Poetry is a superior annual anthology of the nation’s best poets,” says Kassube. “We want to work with partners of that caliber to present more great poems to audiences that don’t yet know they love poetry.”