In Search of Lorine Niedecker : Film and Talk

Director Cathy Cook and Poet Jonathan Skinner in Person

Lorine Niedecker
Immortal Cupboard: In Search of Lorine Niedecker, 73 min, video (2009)
by Cathy Cook

Plus a talk Particular Attention: Lorine Niedecker's Natural Histories
by Jonathan Skinner

In her subjective exploration of the poet Lorine Niedecker (1903 - 1970), Immortal Cupboard, Cathy Cook weaves an elaborate document from Niedecker's biography, literary associations (with poets Cid Corman and Louis Zukofsky) and her midwestern environs. The threads of nature, history, ecology, gender, domesticity, work, culture, family and social politics create a testament to "the extraordinary works of this very private poet that some literary critics have described as the 20th century's Emily Dickinson." (CC)

Since 1982 Cathy Cook has been creating films, videos, and installations She has exhibited her award-winning work extensively in both solo and group shows including screenings at MOMA and the Whitney Museum; her media works are in the permanent collections of the Donnell Library (NYC), Princeton University, National Library of Australia (Canberra), and the NYU Film Library, among others. She is Associate Professor of Film/Video in Visual Arts at The University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC), teaching film/video production, animation, writing and aesthetics.

Jonathan Skinner edits the journal Ecopoetics, which features creative-critical intersections between writing and ecology. Skinner's poetry collections include With Naked Foot (2009) and Political Cactus Poems (2005). His essays on the poets Ronald Johnson and Lorine Niedecker appeared recently in volumes published by the National Poetry Foundation and by University of Iowa Press. He teaches in the Environmental Studies program at Bates College in Central Maine, where he makes his home.