Poet in Residence at the Bluecoat

The residency is over.

Here are some photos taken by Alex Wolkowitz of the final exhibition.

settings by Scott Spencer for my poetry

poems using people's initial impressions of the object while blindfolded

gorgeous folding book made by Emily Speed

gorgeous folding book made by Emily Speed

comic strips by Phil Marsden

Poem setting by Scott Spencer

A performance of my text 'Equinox' directed by Andre Guedes

As near as damnit. These are the acts that will feature in tonight’s show, a special event celebrating the end of my year-long residency at the Bluecoat, featuring new works from top quality practitioners operating at the outer reaches of poetry in performance.

In the first Revolutions in Form event, I presented a combination of musical, poetic, theatrical and physical performances that celebrated the diversity of practice in his area of interest. This event will take the knowledge of this diversity as its starting point, seeking to hone an exploration into the relationship between written work and audience.

firstly, a premiere of a new work called MISUNDERSTANDINGS
The residency as a whole has brought into focus my curiosity in the nature of attention in poetic performance. Sometimes I think poetry performances can be too aggressive. I have seen performances in the Bluecoat’s performance space that have fulfilled the function of performance as a backdrop to a bigger imaginative happening much more effectively, and I will seek to use this potential in my new work, with music, visuals and film by Carl Brown and Scott Spencer

Also performing are:

JOHN O’SHEA
Founder of The Meat License Proposal, a project that investigates plausible morality-based changes to meat laws. John is a genuinely curious and process-based artist. He will be presenting a performance called PENUMBRA.

ROSS SUTHERLAND [CANCELED. SORRY.]

KESTON SUTHERLAND
Whose poem Hot White Andy has been credited as ‘the most remarkable poem in English published this century’ by Jacket Magazine. His work is experimental and unforgivingly dense. A real treat for the imagination.

KAREN MCLEOD
Another of my favourite creative partners, presenting the second draft of a fantastic multimedia performance piece called Scream Away.

and CHIZ TURNROSS
Liverpool-based renaissance man of arts, music and film presents a one-off performance of his audio and vocal work.

opens tomorrow!  Very excited…

Mistranslations

an exhibition of interpretations and collaborations with poet Nathan Jones as part of a residency at the Bluecoat / 16^th – 26^th June

Exhibits

Misunderstanding giclee print // In Girum Imus Nocte Et Consumimur Igni digital print

The Orphan digital print // Museum giclee print //

with Scott Spencer www.joyofatoy.co.uk

A series of poetry prints forming the central body of work of this exhibition. The poems for these pieces are formed by interrogating existing texts by poets and philosophers through various distortions and elaborations – including a technique combining automatic writing with internet translation software. We hope the resulting poems and artworks have an illusive and rewarding depth. In Girum was first displayed as part of an art happening in a church in Shoreditch, London, and references, among other things, the idiosyncratic form of the church billboard.

Before Love

with Markus Soukup www.toofastproductions.co.uk

The poem for this film is again developed through distorting an original text – this time the parable ‘Before the Law’ from Kafka’s The Trial has been translated through the metaphor ‘Love is law’. Markus’ film was envisaged as an environment in which to really listen to the vocal, while developing a visual imagery which builds on the themes of the poem-within-the-poem, abstraction and realism, and the nature of the poetical work as an environment which the audience explore.

The Saddest Day of Her Miracle Year /

The Gods Try Once in a Million Years digital print

with Phillip Marsden www.phillipmarsden.com

Continuing ideas of interpretations, distortions and partner-pieces, my original poem, The Saddest Day of Her Miracle Year was adapted into a comic strip by Phil. At the same time, Phil created corresponding frames for a strip that would be a reflection of the first. I have responded to this second strip with a new poem.

The Coming performance document

with Sarah Nicolls www.sarahnicolls.com

This document aims to record the nature of a collaboration between me and Sarah, composed and performed on a prepared piano several times between 2008-10, and conversations around the vocabulary of performance in poetry and music. The notation is Sarah’s work, with a view to creating a source document that fellow musicians and performers can use to recreate the piece. It is presented here with a drawing by Neil Keeting, who collaborated with us on a performance of this piece in October 2009.

Slow Magic book

with Emily Speed www.emilyspeed.co.uk

Emily and I share an interest in notions of architecture and psychology. Here she has created a special folding print for a poem I wrote to accompany the Bluecoat’s Slow Magic exhibition. A limited number of these books are for sale, please ask at the Bluecoat front desk.

Self Portraits text and photographs

with Appau Junior Boakye-Yiadom www.boakye-yiadom.com

This collaboration mixes Junior’s fascination with the unspoken vocabularies inherent in objects, and my own interest in exploring the nature of the reader/writer relationship in a low-volume book market.

Equinox text print and ex-brick

with Andre Guedes

This extract text was originally presented as part of an exhibition by Andre, as the culmination of artistic research into the undocumented histories of the Bluecoat. It is seen here in a new setting designed by the artist, including a crushed brick from the original Bluecoat building archive.

I have added John O’Shea to the bill for 18th June, to replace Ross Sutherland who can’t make it.

I have worked closely with John O’Shea on this residency – especially quite early on, when John and I investigated some of the implications of the phrase ‘Poetic Justice’. In particular we looked at the relative structures of the metaphor and the legal contract. It was interesting, and as I remember wildly funny – although I can’t remember for the life of me why we were laughing so much. Someone’s drawing looked like some boobs or something probably.

Anyway, John is one of the most interesting artists I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. He practice is based firmly on the need for interrogation of accepted norms, and a curiosity in sociological issues.  He is currently working on an AHRC Research Project at Newcastle University’s Culture Lab proposing and prototyping new kinds of technological ‘interface’ between citizen and law.

The performance is called PENUMBRA, and I guess it will feature some kind of technological articfact from John’s studies. I’m sure his presence will help us explore and consider the possibilities of the word in performance – not only through the form of his presentation, but in what his artworks imply.

————-

I am also delighted to include work from a project with Appau Junior Boake-Yiadom in the accompanying exhibition. I met Junior when he exhibited in the group show to accompany Sonia Boyce’s Like Love exhibition. He is a very entertaining artist, creating works that make us question the visual vocabulary of familar objects. He has his own solo show on in London at the moment too.

Over several sessions, Junior and I developed a way of working that met in the center of our practices. We had blindfold participants hold objects, gave them some time and fuel for imaginative interpretation of this object, and then asked them a series of personal interrogative questions with the object as a focal point. I then used the responses to this questions to produce cut-up poems. The result hopefully presents a new way of looking at the object, and gives a kind of shared mapping of very personal interpretations. We will be displaying these works alongside pictures of the objects.  Here is an example, ‘by’ Ullysses from the Bluecoat information desk:

Self Portrait as a Small Red Briefcase

Try to imagine the sky, if you have seen

the sky before. It is 3D, it doesn’t smell of much

except those sandals that squeak when you walk.

Before now, it was molecules that were swirling

and decided to form something quite small

but with something big inside.

An industrial taste, maybe a mix between candy

and an amusement park that tastes of candy.

I will remember its texture.

Like a boy arriving at school with his new sandwich box.

Both good and bad at the same time. A force of nature.

At once at peace and excited.

We share these molecules and these philosophies.

It is very quiet. Like when you are sleeping,

are you there for something, then?

You are not acting, but you are playing a part, right?

You can feel the air,

more than hear anything inside it,

maybe your own blood pressure going through the brain.

Then suddenly the sound of the joy of being opened: ‘Ah!’

and you respond, ‘Ah!’

And then you wake.

You open like the sky full of playing cards,

your eyes two cells with velvet inside.

REVOLUTIONS IN FORM #2: Misunderstandings

A special event celebrating the end of my year-long residency at the Bluecoat, featuring new works from top quality practitioners operating at the outer reaches of poetry in performance.

In the first Revolutions in Form event, I presented a combination of musical, poetic, theatrical and physical performances that celebrated the diversity of practice in his area of interest. This event will take the knowledge of this diversity as its starting point, seeking to hone an exploration into the relationship between written work and audience.

MISUNDERSTANDINGS
The residency as a whole has brought into focus my curiosity in the nature of attention in poetic performance. Sometimes I think poetry performances can be too aggressive. I have seen performances in the Bluecoat’s performance space that have fulfilled the function of performance as a backdrop to a bigger imaginative happening much more effectively, and I will seek to use this potential in my new work, with music, visuals and film by Carl Brown and Scott Spencer

Also performing are:

ROSS SUTHERLAND
A poet of massive ambition and experience, and my partner in many poetic enterprises. His work is among some of the most influential in shaping the performance scene, and he has since diversified into film-making, theatre and comedy.

KESTON SUTHERLAND
Who’s poem Hot White Andy has been credited as ‘the most remarkable poem in English published this century’ by Jacket Magazine. His work is experimental and unforgivingly dense. A real treat for the imagination.

KAREN MCLEOD
Another of my favourite creative partners, presenting the second draft of a fantastic multimedia performance piece called Scream Away.

and CHIZ TURNROSS
Liverpool-based renaissance man of arts, music and film presents a one-off performance of his audio and vocal work.

This is a piece with concept and design by Scott Spencer, and words by me.

Below is the draft of the text for my end of residency exhibition, installation and performance… Nothing is confirmed yet, and some people who feature in this text might, frankly, be astounded at my arrogance in including them – but I have every confidence in their ability to work night and day to make it happen for me.

Am linking this baby up so you can check out the calibre of work to expect, and have a good old fashioned browse around.

Mistranslations

An exhibition of artworks drawn from Nathan Jones’ period as Poet in Residence at the Bluecoat

16^th – 26^th June, 2010

@ Lost Soul and Stranger Service Station, the Bluecoat, School Lane, Liverpool

featuring print, video and illustrative work by

Scott Spencer

Emily Speed

Philip Marsden

Markus Soukup

Sarah Nicolls

Neil Keeting

and Andre Guedes

PLUS new typography installation by Bobby Newall in the Bluecoat ‘vide’ stairwell: ‘Vulnerability’

*** special event 18^th June, Revolutions in Form #2, featuring a multimedia performance by Nathan, with new ambient music by Wave Machines and visuals by Scott Spencer. Also featuring performances by Ross Sutherland, Keston Sutherland, Karen McLeod and Chiz Turnross ***

I will post more details up here about these collaborative works, once I know what is going on with any of my collaborators.

N

x

Just had a meeting with Alastair Upton, Chief Executive here at the Bluecoat. I really wanted to know about how my understanding of creative process and its reflection in character, behaviour and life was represented at the ‘top’ of the chain here organisationally.

In particular I was thinking about these aspects of creativity, which seem at their root to conflict with the nature of ‘a building’ and ‘an institution’…
1. Vulnerability
2. Wildness

You can interpret these words however you wish, but the way I think of them is interlinking states of being that produce an atmosphere within one’s self that is conducive to creating. Conversations I have had with artists produce similar answers, which will be familiar to us all, regarding those moments that we feel at our most creative, and where creativity seems a common sense response to existence.

“I wanted to put myself out there”
“You have no defense to criticism, other than to make more work”
“It just came to me. Hopefully I was prepared for it.”
“It is about good nerves, focusing the attention on what you are doing and forgetting the environment.”
“It feels like you can ruin the whole thing if you aren’t alert to the idea at that moment [of inspiration]”

It will take more time to reflect on these things, Vulnerability and Wildness, and refine my understanding of how I think they are integral to the creative experience, and I’m sure that there are other aspects that I haven’t managed to boil down and understand at all yet – including something that is broadly related to a ‘coming together’ of heritage and the inheritance of a ‘right’ to produce the work that you happen to be working on at that time. Anyway, for now all I have is those two words, and a couple of first draft poems that reflect my limited understanding of them. I have posted the poems HERE and HERE.

The meeting with Alastair came with a fantastic opportunity to speak about these things in a very clear and rigourous (if informally so) fashion – which I guess comes with the kinds of responsibilities that he has, and his need to reflect and respond to the environment he is creating. Even at this level, it’s clear that an arts institution is an essentially creative endevour, which relies on the same mastery, understanding and acceptance of dualities: like Technique/Intuition and feelings of Power/Powerlessness, which all creative being have to deal with…

One ‘management’ tool that Alastair pointed me towards was MBTI ‘type’ indicator. It’s really interesting to think about how you fit into the categories of this Jungian tool, especially if we reflect on the fact that the creative world is made up of all different types of these characters, benefiting from this or that type of experience in devising and producing work.

The first ‘type’ distinguished in this scale is the E-I Dichotomy:

“Where do you prefer to focus your attention?” “Where do you get energy?”

a) Extroversion: directing energy towards people and by taking action. Work though ideas by talking, learn best by doing or discussing.
b) Introversion: direct energy inwards, and receive energy from reflecting on thoughts memories or feelings.

This is a really interesting dichotomy for me, because I would count myself among the group that gains much more from talking ideas through and creating with conversation as fuel, but some of the central people in my creative and personal life I am sure get much more of their energy from reflection.

This reflects also on a distinction I have been making in my talk about the facade of a creative building with its bright atriums and clean interiors, and the filthy work of creativity that happens in the unseen passages.

N

Came across this report of a Kurt Schwitters performance on Jerome Rothenburg’s blog. Heartwarming the possibilities of performance art! Makes me want to look for something totally unexpected, and joyful, in my own performance on 18th June.

Schwitters stood on the podium, drew himself up to his full six feet plus, and began to perform the Ur Sonata, complete with hisses, roars and crowings, before an audience who had no experience whatever of anything modern. At first they were completely baffled, but after a couple of minutes the shock began to wear off. For another five minutes protest was held in check by the respect due Frau Kiepenhauer’s house. But this restraint served only to increase the inner tension. I watched delightedly as two generals in front of me pursed their lips as hard as they could to stop themselves laughing. Their faces, above their upright collars, turned first red, then slightly bluish. And then they lost control. They burst laughing, and the whole audience, freed from the pressure that had been building up inside them, exploded in an orgy of laughter. The dignified old ladies, the stiff generals, shrieked with laughter, gasped for breath, slapped their thighs, choked themselves. Kurtchen was not in the least bit put out by this. He turned up the volume of his enormous voice to Force Ten and simply swamped the storm of laughter in the audience, so that the latter seemed almost to be an accompaniment to the Ur Sonata. … The hurricane blew itself out as rapidly as it had arisen. Schwitters spoke the rest of his Ur Sonata without further interruption. The result was fantastic. The same generals, the same rich ladies, who had previously laughed until they cried, now came to Schwitters, again with tears in their eyes, almost stuttering with admiration and gratitude. Something had been opened up within them, something they had never expected to feel: a great joy.

I am putting together a short talk for my show in a few weeks. Came across this excerpt from an Adrienne Rich poem (http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=175905), while looking at ‘pyrotechnic’ poets. I think it might explain why I have decided to dwell in writing prose for a while. Perhaps I am running out of patience!

From, MIDNIGHT SALVAGES

7
This horrible patience which is part of the work
This patience which waits for language for meaning for the
least sign
This encumbered plodding state doggedly dragging
the IV up and down the corridor
with the plastic sack of bloodstained urine

Only so can you start living again
waking to take the temperature of the soul
when the black irises lean at dawn
from the mouth of the bedside pitcher
This condition in which you swear I will
submit to whatever poetry is
I accept no limits Horrible patience