Co-edited and organized by Anna Ehrsam and Katherine Jackson.
They are scheduling more readings, studio visits, and other events
through the winter and into the spring. Please contact Anna or Katherine
to schedule an event.
Uni-Verse Poetry - Prints - Proofs by Visionary Humans unites the poems and visual art of 82 contemporary artists to create a portrait of diversity, multiplicity, and oneness.
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Mary Ann Strandell, Hudson Yards Black with Kimono, 3D Lenticular Media, 20” x 14”, 2019 @maryannstrandell |
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| Open Book. Anna Ehrsam on left; Standell on right, and you tube | . | |
New York, NEW YORK, September 20, 2020 – In times of crisis, art and poetry provide philosophical and spiritual insights, catharsis, and healing. For millennia, artists and poets have been the visionaries whose work possesses the power to capture the full range of human experience, from the horrors of war to the ecstasy of transcendent love. The vision behind this collection is to create a vast wealth of powerful expression that is both deeply enmeshed in the specificity of history and at the same time, an enduring, crucial, human constant. The artists and poets chosen for this book create an intersectional, multi-generational poesis, from David Ferry, who is 96, to Adelaide Holden, 6. Each poem is paired with a visual work, creating an interweaving of human witness that grows exponentially as the book progresses. This is a book to return to over and over, not always starting at the beginning, but finding new vibrant pathways through its proliferating interconnections.
Some of the poets and artists in the book are Tom Sleigh, Rosanna Warren, Rowan Ricardo Phillips, Gail Mazur, Alan Shapiro, Roger Bonair-Agard, Elaine Equi, Mel Chin, Deborah Kass, Susan Bee, Michael Joaquin Grey, and Michael Rees.
Following are comments about the book:
“This book is a joy, a rare marvel, a true feast for the senses.” – Rowan Ricardo Phillips, poet, author of Living Weapon, 2013 Whiting Award winner, and professor at Williams College
“Many spreads in this volume embody Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s belief that ‘as long as there is poetry, there will be an unknown, as long as there is an unknown there will be poetry,’ by pairing works of art and poetry that at first look may be unknowable, but create synergy that stole my consonants: “Ooooh!” The oldest and youngest poets bounce off each other eloquently—96-year-old David Ferry, National Book Award winner, paints a stark evocation of a Walker Evans photograph, while Grace MacNair so accurately describes ‘The starlings—/out-swung in sheets’ in ‘The Shape of Air.’ Go spend good time with this volume, as it artfully makes the unknown more knowable.” – Tina Kelley, poet, author of Rise Wildly, and winner of a 2003 Washington State Book Award and a staff Pulitzer Prize at The New York Times
