European Poetry festival - summer 2021, a mini documentary

Nice to have this small documentary as a kind of gentle summation of the EPF summer 2021 program, which presented a quartet of events in London, returning to live happenings across the city. From our showcase Camarade, with 20 UK-baed European poets presenting new works in pairs at St Johns on Bethnal Green, to an outdoor reading in Richmond Park and events held in collaboration with the Scottish Poetry Library, Peer Gallery and more. All events were free to attend and socially distanced.

The EPF will return in winter 2021, November 18th to December 3rd with events featuring international poets from across the continent, with events celebrating Austrian, Swiss, Spanish, Latvian, Hungarian, Swedish, Norwegian poets and more. https://www.europeanpoetryfestival.com/

A note on: minidoc about Struga

Struga was my 51st poetry festival outside of engerland and often ive returned wishing I had documented these experiences better, being as they are often so idiosyncratic. I finally invested a bit of time in making a minidoc supercut of such a trip and Im quietly happy with the result. It captures just a touch of what it was like to be there.

Auld Enemies: a documentary on poetry, touring, Scotland & collaboration

What this means to me, Ross Sutherland's generous, technically excellent and warm hearted documentary of our Auld Enemies tour of Scotland, is quite significant. It's the most apt testament to what we did, in it's humour and flow and deference, and its so rare to have something concrete, something that will last, that somehow captures one of these poetry things I've been experiencing in the last year. So many times, like with my visits to Iraq, Mexico, Denmark, Venice etc.. in the last year, the experience feels so intense, so wonderful at the time that I know I'll remember it so fondly, and it'll be so significant to me, and yet there is only the work itself and the memory left. Which is a good thing. Yet when I confront this documentary, see what it stands for, for me, I am left feeling very grateful, very humbled that I might get to relive something very special, in the years to come, through it's being watched. 

Auld Enemies in London

It all ends up in London, and so we reconvened at the Rich Mix Arts Centre to invite new pairs of poets, screen some of Ross Sutherland's amazing documentary he made during our Scotland tour and share excerpts of the core poet's collaborations. A lovely evening to come together so soon, to reminiscence {already} and share our experience with friends and the like.  Auld Enemies London
Ross Sutherland & Colin Herd & Ryan Van Winkle & nick-e melville & SJ Fowler https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GSUC5L742SQ
Emily Berry & John Clegg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJeKEFHrpUA
Vahni Capildeo & Jeremy Noel-Tod https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfA6MIC94mo
Tim Atkins & Jeff Hilson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi6wp_2wLFQ
Nick Murray & Eley Williams https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9RD4-hGK84
Kirsty Irving & Harry Man https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VP91dLg1qk