Poem by Dziga Vertov: "Start, 1917"

Daniel Kasman

Start
1917
Not like Pathé.
Not like Gaumont.
Not how they see,
Not as they want.
Be Newton
to see
an apple.
Give people eyes
To see a dog
With
Pavlov’s
eye.
Is cinema CINEMA?
We blow up cinema,
For
CINEMA
to be seen.

(Dziga Vertov: The Laboratory of Hearing, 1917)

[Translation: Julian Graffy]

***

Text generously provided by the Austrian Film Museum from Dziga Vertov: The Vertov Collection at the Austrian Film Museum; Vienna: FilmmuseumSynemaPublikationen Vol. 4, 2006; edited by the Austrian Film Museum, Thomas Tode and Barbara Wurm.

The book is available for purchase for European readers here and for American readers here.  More resources on Dziga Vertov from the Austrian Film Museum can be found at their Online Vertov Collection resource, here.

***

From April 15 - June 4, 2011 New York's Museum of Modern Art is showing a large retrospective on the work of Dziga Vertov.

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