Some photos from the video cameras yesterday for a videopoem called ‘unfurlflowerrings.' My favourite is the multiple exposure - a technique I am playing with.
I’ve planned this shoot for years (since 2022, when I created and performed it at Minstrels & Bards), and now it’s done! Since I can’t afford to hire anyone, I asked a few people for help without response. And then Steve O'Brien came and helped set it up, held a camera, and while I made sure to include him in the shoot, I couldn’t be more grateful for friends like him.
In all, with set up of a few cameras, a ton of foliage to cover the rabbit warren in my patio space, the box I came out of (that I spray painted over a year ago), a pizza dinner break, videoing, packing it all away and raking all fake leaves so the rabbits have their home intact, it took 5 hours.
With the gift of help from a friend, I couldn’t push it and have a rehearsal, but it was planned down to the details, no real choreography only impromptu movement, and I think it worked out. One of those blessings in life.
UnfurlFlowerrings by Brenda Clews - earliest version Live 2022
I performed this poem, unfurflowerrings, at my Minstrels & Bards poetry & music event in October 2022. It's a poem about Spring goddesses and an aging woman in a corset with corsages blooming from her breast, ivy draped over her arms.
A mask comes in a vision and I try to realize it, and then spend months, a year, composing a costume around it. And leave writing a poem to the last minute, which, yes, I did as the deadline approached. I wrote the poem on the Sunday, edited and memorized it on Monday and performed it on Tuesday. Some poets I highly respect were there and I was nervous presenting it in this whole get-up! This is the earliest version of the poem, it was later added to and edited, and I think I'll keep the bones of the poem but take it in a different direction for the final version later this year or next year now that I've shot the footage outdoors I had hoped for.
I wove the mask to read a Hopkins sprung rhyme poem at Dead Poets Society in December 2019. It became the focal point for a costume as Spring wove its way into my imagination. I do a ton of research when I am composing a costume around a concept. The flowers were partially inspired by Schiaparelli and the corset and transparent hoop skirt by Dior.
Mask, costume, poem, performance and editing by Brenda Clews. It's been unlisted since 2022, for 4 years, and I am finally publishing it publicly in 2026.
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