I hope. I’ve been so swamped with the Visible Verse Festival I haven’t had much time to devote to fundraising. I’ve set up a Let’s Send Visible Verse to VideoBardo IndieGoGo campaign and raised a little dough but still have a long way to go. I hate to beg but please make a donation if you can.

A great professional opportunity awaits in Argentina! I have been invited to present a keynote address at the 4th VideoBardo Festival/Conference in Buenos Aires on the theme of “Videopoetry; New Perspectives on an Interdisciplinary Practice.” I will be presenting a paper called “Seeing The Voice: Beyond Media.” Material from the symposium will become part of a theoretical publication with academic and cultural purposes.

Since 1999, and as founder of the Vancouver Videopoem and Visible Verse Festivals, I have worked hard to provide a venue for the genre, contributed vigorously to the theoretical knowledge of the form and on Aug. 24th, will be honored for my work with a Pandora Literary Award. This is from their press release: “Stimulating and directing cultural fulmination is as natural to Haley as manipulating media. She is an innovative programmer with a history of staunch commitment to the arts community and cultural awareness. With a strongly held conviction that artists, especially poets, needed to be represented on the World Wide Web, she founded The Edgewise Café in 1994, one of Canada’s first electronic literary magazines, along with the non-profit arts organization, the Edgewise ElectroLit Centre. The EEC facilitated the Vancouver Videopoem Festival and Telepoetics, a videoconferenced reading series. The Edgewise ElectroLit Centre’s populist mandate and innovative programs effectively made poetry accessible to all and assisted Canadian artists in expanding both their audience and potential.”

VideoBardo is one of the few international events acknowledged for its comprehensive exploration and dissemination of information related to videopoetry. My participation in the festival/conference will contribute greatly to my development as both a curator and practicing artist.

It’s a wonderful opportunity in so many ways; I will meet like-minded artists with whom to exchange ideas and information, helping to raise the profile of a rather obscure but emerging art form, though it seems there are new videopoetry festivals and sites popping up all over the world every day. While at the festival/conference, I will be attending screenings, lectures, workshops, performances and will also participate in a poetry reading.

As much as I love what I do, I am a struggling artist and cultural work sadly doesn’t pay much. I need to raise the airfare—an expensive, long trip to Buenos Aires from Vancouver—a per diem, inner city travel and accommodations. Having never been to South America, I’m excited at the prospect of making new contacts and becoming immersed in the city’s culture, fortunate to have festival organizers as guides.

My work in the genre may be viewed here at Vimeo.

I just established my own company with my teenaged son as editor called Visible Verse Productions.

These links were provided by VideoBardo director Javier Robledo and contain pertinent information about the conference’s venues and scheduled events:

•27th Nov -> Palais de Glace
•28th Nov -> CCEBA (Centro Cultural de España en Buenos Aires plus Malba plus Biblioteca Nacional
•29th Nov -> CCEBA + Fundación Hampatu
•30 th Nov-> CCEBA + Biblioteca Nacional
1st Dec -> Microcine IMPA Oracio Campos
•2nd Dec -> Club Pejerrey de Quilmes
•Creo Producciones