What is a word? What is a language? What is a poem?
Questions like this are basic in kakaoase (2016), the third part of a collaboration between Norwegian poet and artist Ottar Ormstad and the Russian composer and musician Taras Mashtalir, under the name OTTARAS. The video is made by the Russian video-artist Alexander Vojjov, and is based on a poem by Ormstad presented as a digital print in a solo-exhibition in Oslo, Norway (2006).
Even though the poem has a basis in the Norwegian language, the focus is on the sound. People who speak Norwegian will not find a lot of meaning involved, maybe some words constructed in a little funny way? The original print is made as a continuously “never-ending” text. Each “word” consists of five syllables, all of them ending with the same sound, creating an end-rhyme. In this video the “words” are presented separately when read by the poet, as a very atypical sound-poem.
Video HD 16:9 duration: 04:10, color, stereo
Video: Alexander Vojjov
Music: Taras Mashtalir
Concrete poetry, sound poetry and production by Ottar Ormstad
© Ottar Ormstad 2015