The Europoe Trilogy : 2020

I had to cancel my festival of European Poetry in October 2020 and made three films instead. The films were an attempt to truly collaborate at a remove, to avoid anaemic zoom, which captures nothing of the uniqueness of the times, and to endeavour to make something that might last. Films about what didn’t happen, about absence, and about something honest - that the lockdown caused horror for many, but for the lucky others, a kind of dark, clouded, strange cloud of screen and walls. The films were each very different from the last and consolidated much of what I’ve been exploring 2018 to 2020 with poetry-films, through the Animal Drums, Worm Wood and other projects. This was a real burst of work, making these three films, as we basically had a month to make them all. It was fantastic. Thanks to all the generous staff I worked with at the Austrian Cultural Forum, the Swedish Embassy in the UK and the Hungarian Cultural Centre, producers of the films truly, and to the brilliant work of David Spittle, Benedict Taylor and the many poetry ‘stars’ of the films.

An empty house and the people who should have been there. 

As three Austrian poets come to terms with the prisons of the now and their host is forced to confront their absence, Where Are You Austria documents their poetic descent into madness. What follows is as uncanny as it is unlikely, and, ultimately, inevitable. An epic poetry film about the consequences of that which does not happen, the intimacy of isolation, metal work and Erwin Schrödinger.

Supported by Austrian Cultural Forum, London. A film by David Spittle. Written & conceived by Steven J. Fowler. Starring Franziska Füchsl, Max Höfler, Robert Prosser, SJ Fowler. Director of Photography and Editor : David Spittle. Music by Benedict Taylor. https://www.europeanpoetryfestival.com/austriafilm

From a lonely London a figure calls out for the lost poets and three Swedes will answer, each in their own way, with poetic precision and desolate northern sensibilities. The Swedish Beest is less than a cry for help and more than a poetry film; it is a documentary of those who are not there, a gathering of readings out of time and place.

Supported by supported by The Embassy of Sweden, London. A film by Steven J Fowler. Starring Aase Berg, Jonas Gren and Ida Börjel. Music by Benedict Taylor. Edited and photography by David Spittle.

A film as part of the European Poetry Festival Digital program. With no physical events in 2020, EPF digital reveals what can be created without proximity, generating new insights into poetic practice in continental Europe and creating ambitious film-poetry collaborations especially for this two week e-fest. https://www.europeanpoetryfestival.com/swedenfilm

Four talking heads. Three Hungarians. One vacuum cleaner.

They are poets, they are miserable, and they are cut off from the world. United by sardonic pride, they come together to represent their country and wage war on the dust bunnies of the mind in this poetic deepdive. A daring poetry film, The Hungarian Vacuum is part gripping mystery, part arthouse project, part literary podcast, part poetry reading, and part utter failure. You will have questions, but you’re not likely to get any answers.

Supported by Hungarian Cultural Centre, London. A film by Steven J Fowler. Starring Kornelia Deres, Kinga Toth, Peter Zavada. Music by Benedict Taylor. Edited by Botond Bartha. https://www.europeanpoetryfestival.com/hungaryfilm

epfdidi.png
acf_logo-1024x210.jpg
MKI_London_red_CMYK-100+(1).jpg