LANGUAGE TO COVER A WALL: Visual Poetry Through Its Changing Media

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Just when you thought you'd seen it all "visual poetry" flies onto the scene with everything from Pueblo Indian petroglyphs (circa 1350-1680), contemporary concrete poems, eye poems, typestracts (abstract typewriter art), poem-objects and media-savvy digital poems presented by a wide range of writer/artists working in many media.

"LANGUAGE TO COVER A WALL: Visual Poetry Through Its Changing Media" is the name of the exhibition that will be presented from Nov. 17 to Feb. 18 by the University at Buffalo Art Gallery in Center for the Arts on the North Campus.

The opening is on Nov. 17 with a free public reception from 5-7 p.m.

It will be one of the largest single gatherings of such work ever assembled. Focusing on visual and concrete poetry, in which the visual arrangement of text, images and symbols combine to create an intended effect, this alternative to standard linear poetry occupies a space between poetry and visual art but some of it -- "intermedia" poetry -- blurs the distinction between writing, graphic art, video, dance and music.

What visitors will see:

-- Works of visual poetry arranged by medium often juxtaposed so as to demonstrate the dramatic shift successive new media have brought to the concepts and definitions of poetry. The exhibition curatorial team (Steve McCaffery, David Gray Chair Professor of Poetry and Letters, UB Department of English; Karen Mac Cormack, UB adjunct professor of English; and Michael Basinski, curator of the UB Poetry Collection) seeks to increase awareness of concrete and visual poetry and its ongoing possibilities.

-- A "Digital Poetry" component curated by Loss Pequeno Glazier, associate professor of media study, will be presented in the Second Floor Gallery, Center for the Arts. It will focus on bringing the traditions of visual poetry into present-day digital poetics. These practices include works in a variety of formats, including computer-generated poetry, time-based works, language and video, and digital poetry and dance.

-- An opening address by Marvin Sackner, "jw curry's Exemplary Archive," Nov. 17 at 5:45 p.m. in the UB Art Gallery, Center for the Arts. Sackner is co-founder with his wife, Ruth, of the Sackner Archive of Visual and Concrete Poetry, which holds collections of visual poetry from more than 50 countries, including an archive of work produced and collected by avant-garde Canadian poet, publisher and bookseller jw curry.

-- A Sound Poetry Performance by internationally acclaimed Canadian sound poets Paul Dutton, Nobuo Kubota and W. Mark Sutherland, Nov. 17 from 6:15-7 p.m.

-- An evening of Digital Poetry and Dance on Feb. 3 at 7:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. in the Black Box Theater, Center for the Arts, featuring dance interpretations of historic digital poetry work. Co-presenters are the E-Poetry Festivals, the UB Electronic Poetry Center and the Department of Media Study in collaboration with the Department of Theater and Dance.

-- Digital Poetry in Performance on Feb. 4 at 7:30 p.m. in the Center for the Arts will feature world premiere performances of electronic, visual, sound, video and text works by an international gathering of digital poets to celebrate the exhibition.

-- Performance Events on Feb. 17 from 5-7 p.m. to mark the closure of the exhibition in the UB Art Gallery, Center for the Arts. These will showcase work by visual and sound poetry groups Buffluxus and TRG (Toronto Research Group).

The work to be exhibited comes from several sources including the UB Poetry Collection, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Niagara University's Castellani Art Museum and the collections of Steve McCaffery and Karen Mac Cormack, Dennis and Barbara Tedlock, and many of the practitioners themselves.

An historical range of works by George Herbert, Lewis Carroll, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Barbara Kruger, Henri Chopin, Robert Lax, Dick Higgins, Daniel Spoerri, Alison Knowles, d.a. levy, Bob Cobbing, Siebren Versteeg, bpNichol, Bill Bissett and Guy de Cointet are among the 300-plus on view.

Funding for the exhibition was provided by the UB Art Galleries, David Gray Chair of Poetry and Letters (Steve McCaffery), The James H. McNulty Chair (Dennis Tedlock), The Poetry Collection of the UB Libraries, the Canadian-American Studies Committee at UB, and the Government of Canada.

Generous support has also been provided by the Canadian Consulate, Buffalo, N.Y.; Electronic Poetry Center, UB Department of Media Study; and Gaylord Bros., with additional thanks to the Albright-Knox Art Gallery; Castellani Art Museum of Niagara University; and Niagara Artists Centre, St. Catharines, Ontario.