Blooming in the Whirlwind, our digital short film festival debuts Saturday, October 10, featuring an eclectic lineup of collaborative short poem-films, live poetry readings, and artists Q&A's right here on our website and over on our Instagram Live and IGTV. Before they all go live on Instagram, we wanted to take a minute to introduce the artists screening films and reciting poetry in Saturday’s festival. 

Anthony D. Frederick

Pronouns: he/him

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
Exactly that, it's collaborative. The chance to engage with someone else's material, witness what it arises in me, and then get to work to physically manifest it is exactly what's exciting about any and all of this.

Tell us about your artistic practice. What excites you as a filmmaker? What ideas do you explore in your films?
What excites me most about the filmmaking process can be roughly described in secular terms as Chaos Theory.

Weirdest purchase since quarantine began?
A month's membership on the Bumble app. The reasoning behind this purchase was...multilayered.

If you could only pick one movie, book, video game, album, etc. to spend the rest of quarantine with, what would you pick?
I'd pick the movie I'm writing right now. It'd be spectacular if everything else disappeared for the rest of quarantine; it's hard to imagine how much progress I'd make.

Catch Anthony’s talk with poet Jireh Deng at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10, live on Instagram. See more of Anthony’s work at anthonydfrederick.com.

Jireh deng

Pronouns: she/her and they/them

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
I think the idea that we can still make art at this time when we are socially distant makes me hopeful. I want to see how I can continue to make connections with other artists and expand my craft.

Tell us about your artistic practice. What excites you as a poet? What ideas do you explore in your poems?
What really inspires me as a poet is seeing how the world is constantly moving. We as poets try to capture the essence of those moments and funnel them onto the page. When I sit down to write, there's purpose, I'm either mailing off a poem to a friend or I'm trying to remember or reclaim an experience or an emotion. So it excites me the most when people can resonate with my work or see themselves reflected in my writing. I'm always trying to be specific and in tune with what's happening around me. 

If you had to quarantine with one other person for the rest of your life (and it could be anyone in the world) who would you pick and why?
Hands down my sister. She's kind of already in quarantine with me at home with our family, but I want to actually move out of the house with her next semester. She knows my weird thought process, we get along pretty well, and she's uproariously funny.

What are you doing, if anything, to find joy and peace during this turbulent year?
I've been rediscovering my love for recreational reading and forcing myself to make time for it even when I'm busy. Right now I’m  reading Minor Feelings by Cathy Park Hong which has absolutely blown my mind as another Asian American female poet. She describes in clarity all these unnameable things that I had been experiencing in the writing world and drawn them into focus. 

Catch Jireh’s talk with filmmaker Anthony D. Frederick at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10, live on Instagram. See more of Jireh’s work on Instagram at @jireh_deng.

labkhand olfatmanesh

Pronouns: she/her

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
Exchanging information, learning from each other and starting a new friendship.

Tell us about your artistic practice. What excites you as a filmmaker? What ideas do you explore in your films?
I tell personal stories about my subjects, myself and my relationship to identity and gender within two cultures the United States and Iran. Communication, and barriers to communication, factor into my interests. The physicality of barriers also relates to blocked layers of communication across cultures and generations.The interplay between transparency, masks, alter identities, and shadow selves comes back again and again in my work, through materials and theory, influenced by Jung and Freud. 

What's your typical quarantine outfit these days?
Spring dresses.

If you could only pick one movie, book, video game, album, etc. to spend the rest of quarantine with, what would you pick?
The book Against Interpretation by Susan Sontag and the musical album Elwan by Tinariwen.

Catch Labkhand at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10, live on Instagram. See more of Labkhand’s work at labbiemanesh.com and on Instagram at @labbiephotography.

madeleine st. john

Pronouns: she/her 

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
As a human who metabolizes her embodied experience through language, inimitably weighted in words as I navigate the liminalities of being, I highly admire visual art's ability to echo the nuances of feeling through suggestion, versus my stabs at precision by way of articulation. It’s long been a foggy and distant dream to have my poetry adapted or augmented visually. This is also a first for me. That said, I am approaching the collaboration with curiosity, candor, and trust. I look forward to witnessing and being witnessed.

How long have you been writing poetry? How did you get started in your field?
I’ve loved language and felt a deep sense of connection to communication since infancy, really. I spoke early, took up journaling at age six, began writing poems at age eight, and developed a deep affection for sonnets as a teen. Unfortunately, and ironically, this piece of my identity and its accompanying  practice fell to the wayside during my college years when I participated in a rigorous classical learning program at a religious university. Three years later, my work at a non-profit arts education organization was the impetus for its recovery.

In my work managing a community of volunteers, artists, and other constituents, I was reminded of the practical power that words possess -- to mobilize, to create meaning, to cultivate connection. Additionally, by living and working in consistent proximity to arts programming, I nurtured the courage to be more responsive to this nascent quality and capacity within me. I’ve been writing consistently -- both prose and poetry -- since 2018. With the exception of a bi-monthly newsletter that I distribute to my stateside community, my practice is rather insouciant and organic.

What's your typical quarantine outfit these days?
I am committed to the bathrobe lifestyle always, but especially these days.

What are you doing, if anything, to find joy and peace during this turbulent year?
I’m moving my body! Virtual dance classes and Dance Movement Therapy sessions have been portals to my wellness.

Catch Madeleine at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10, live on Instagram. See more of Madeleine’s work at madeleinestjohn.com, on Instagram at @madeleinestjohn, and subscribe to her newsletter, “Madeleine in Motion” here.

andrew neel

Pronouns: he/him

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
I love the idea of making visual poetry as a film in response to a poet's written work. And I'm excited about collaborating with my creative partner on this project, Alex Smith. 

Tell us about your artistic practice. What excites you as a filmmaker? What ideas do you explore in your films?
I'm excited by the idea of creating something that captures a moment in time, an emotion that, while fleeting, is nonetheless real and re-configured for others to experience and relate to asynchronously.

How many masks do you own? Do you have a favorite?
10, if you count bandanas. My favorite one is a lightning bolt Bowie-style mask.

If you had to quarantine with one other person for the rest of your life (and it could be anyone in the world) who would you pick and why?
Probably my son, Ziggy. Don't tell Beka, Sam, or Kelvin. But he's my first choice, he cracks me up. 

Catch Andrew at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10, live on Instagram. See more of Andrew’s work on Instagram at @andrewneel and Twitter at  @andrewneel.

alex c. smith

Pronouns: he/him

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
Working with Andrew Neel!

Tell us about your artistic practice. What excites you as a filmmaker? What ideas do you explore in your films?
I'm drawn to stories of loss and grief.  

Weirdest purchase since quarantine began?
A bathroom rug that allows me to slip around the bathroom.

What are you doing, if anything, to find joy and peace during this turbulent year?
Reading, reading, reading.

Catch Alex at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10 live on Instagram. See more of Alex’s work on Instagram at @senator_asmith.

simone tetrault

Pronouns: she/her

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
Writing poetry can be a very solitary process. What excites me most about taking part in this project is having the opportunity to share a deeply personal process with other artists in the spirit of collaboration.

Are there any past accomplishments or projects that you are particularly proud of?
Symphony of the Fourth Dimension was the first play I'd ever written and developed from the ground up, and it took two years to workshop the piece before it premiered at Access Theater in New York City in October of 2015. What I am most proud of is that I took the risk in self-producing a bare-bones production that was incredibly full of heart.

If you could only pick one movie, book, video game, album, etc. to spend the rest of quarantine with, what would you pick?
I’ve been listening to Enya’s album “A Day Without Rain.” It’s an album I owned and listened to a lot as a kid. The soothing sounds and lyrics have brought me calm and comfort in this period of uncertainty.

Catch Simone at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10, live on Instagram. See more of Simone’s work at simonetetrault.com.

Leila jarman

Pronouns: she/her

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
I love collaboration. It's one of my favorite parts of the creative process. You’re able to approach a project from various perspectives and I always learn so much from whoever I’m working with, whatever their medium of creating. 

How long have you been making films? How did you get started in your field?
10+ years. Started in documentary and moved through the various genres from there.

If you could only pick one movie, book, video game, album, etc. to spend the rest of quarantine with, what would you pick?
David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust.

If you had to quarantine with one other person for the rest of your life (and it could be anyone in the world) who would you pick and why?
Myself as a child. (Is time travel possible in this version of quarantine?) I'd love to be able to heal our past traumas together. 

Catch Leila at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10  live on Instagram. See more of Leila’s work at leilajarman.com and on Instagram at @leila_jarman.

Deiselah

Pronouns: she/her 

What excites you about taking part in this collaborative art project Blooming in the Whirlwind?
I love working with creatives. It's something about the things that are birthed when you link with someone who thinks similarly to you or even someone who thinks differently. There is something divine and spirit led that happens. The outcomes  never come up short. It always turns out just right.

How long have you been writing poetry? How did you get started in your field?
I have been writing poetry since the age of 10. It all started in a social studies class. We had to express our feelings about what was going on in the world. I chose the mode of poetry and the writing hasn't stopped since.

Are there any past poetic accomplishments or pieces that you are particularly proud of? 
I recently received my Masters in Poetry and an award from the Stories Matter Foundation.

If you had to quarantine with one other person for the rest of your life (and it could be anyone in the world) who would you pick and why?
I would choose my girlfriend because being with her makes sense and feels like home.

Catch Dei at 11:30 AM on Saturday, October 10  live on Instagram. See more of Dei’s work on Instagram at @deiselah and @deiselahmusic,

Don’t forget to tune in to Instagram Live on Saturday, Oct 10 at 11:30AM and 4:30PM and support the work of these artists!