Each Wednesday, the class will turn to a new art, reading a few poems that engage with it, and some short theoretical texts to give us a set of working concepts. An exercise across the border space will be set over the weekend: for example, reconstruct a poem on the page, as a shelter; rewrite a lyric poem as a script for three voice, with stage directions; sketch a poem frontally, in profile, and in motion; and so on. These are just examples: the particular exercises will be set in collaboration with out guests, and they will emphasize imaginative exploration and intellectual adventure over technical mastery—for none of us could be expert in all these domains.
Exercise Eight (due in class Wednesday, April 13)
Please do the following exercise to create material for an architectural-poetic workshop.
– Write about what happens in a townhouse / house / apartment. How does it open?
– Write about what happens in a theater. How does it open?
– Write about what happens in a park. How does it open?
You may include who goes where and why and when, and how people feel or don’t.
Format your text in Arial font, 11 point, and print out what you write. Please use black font only. If you are writing by hand please use ALL CAPS and black ink. Printed is better.
Bring the prints to class.
(This exercise need not be submitted in advance and no commentary is required.)
Exercise Seven (due 5 PM Sunday, April 3)
This week you will make a 90 second single-shot film using your cell phone or a digital camera. Your film will speak to, underneath, beside, and beyond a poem that you have read this semester in class. Because your film will have no edits, you need to plan in advance. In the language of the cinema, you will determine camera moves and visual gestures by designing a mise-en-scène that will cover the entire film. You might want to draw a story-board. Here you will decide, if the camera will be stationery or in motion, if you will use pans or tilts. In addition, you need to think about how to incorporate your poem. Will there be actual text from the poem on the soundtrack of the film? Will it be diegetic or non-diegetic? Making a film is often collaborative, so you might want to work with someone else as a performer or cinematographer. Or, you might prefer to do everything yourself. Choosing a location is also a key part of the process. Enjoy making this film outside in the spring air, in the privacy of your dorm room, or wherever strikes your fancy. We will watch some of the films in class on April 4.
Please upload your film to this Google Drive folder, along with the usual brief essay explaining what you did and why. (On the Google page, click “New” at upper left and then “File upload.”Please name both files LASTNAME EX7.)
Exercise Six (due 5 PM Sunday, March 27)
Choreograph a poem (or a portion of a poem; at least one line) that we have read this semester. You can submit your choreography in any medium or format: as text, score, video, or another of your choice. As usual, your submission should be accompanied by a brief essay describing what you have done and why.
Exercise Five (due 5 PM Sunday, March 20)
Consider the Bishop and Stand sestinas assigned as reading for the week. Using the six end-words the class generated—DRAIN, LONGING, ORANGE, FRAME, CLOCK, and SPRING—write a sestina in either lineated poetry or prose. Think about how a word can mean something or do something different each time it repeats: change context, association, part of speech, etc. How does the repetition of the end-words progress and become intrinsic to the narrative? As usual, supplement your sestina with a short account of what you did, and how it relates to the questions of the class.
We would like to print and share two or three of the sestinas at the start of class. If for any reason you would prefer not to have your shared, please just say so in your essay.
Exercise Four (due 5 PM Sunday, February 27)
Annotate a short poem or section of a poem we have read (at least ten lines) as a script for performance by one or more actors. You might divide it up among speakers (in which case you should also provide a list of dramatis personae, explaining who the speakers are), provide stage directions (including props, actions, settings), mark particular and/or unusual vocal effects, etc. As usual, also provide a 300-500 word essay explaining what you have done and why, in relation to the themes of the course. (You may if you wish supplement your submission with an audio or video recording, but this is not required; I will respond to it but it will not be considered a formal part of the assignment. I.e., just for fun.) Please send the exercise as a pdf (converted from Word or whatever your word processor is), and name it YOURLASTNAME EX 1.
Exercise Three (due 5 PM Sunday, February 20)
This week, make a digital photo of a poem we have read in the last two weeks. As with last week’s assignment, construe that “of” as you wish: you might want to explore something that the poem itself pictures (that it is “about”); you might want to render something in its structure, its sound, its associations. You could incorporate text, or not. The scale of the representation is also up to you: your photo might be of the poem as a whole, of a line, of a word. Feel free to use digital shenanigans to shape the image but keep faith with its occasion. Your image should be submitted by email by 5 PM Sunday and accompanied by a short essay (300-500 words) describing what you have done and how it relates to the questions of the course. Please send the essay as a pdf (converted from Word or whatever your word processor is), and name both files (the image file and the pdf) YOURLASTNAME EX 1.
Exercise Two (due 5 PM Sunday, February 13)
Make an image of one line from a poem we have read this week (for 2/9 or 2/14). “Of” is a beautifully flexible word, and you can take full advantage of that flexibility. You might want to explore something that the line itself pictures (that it is “about”); you might want to render something in its structure, its sound, its associations. You could incorporate text, or not. This is a project of free translation across media, trying out how an image can read a poem.
Our medium in this case is the cyanotype, and we’ll be making them in class on Monday with Accra Shepp. You can get an overview of how to make them here, see some examples (courtesy of Eve Aschheim) here. We’ll meet in the print shop at 185 Nassau, and we’ll have all the supplies, and instructions, on hand. To prepare, you’ll want to choose your poetic line, and give some thought to its possible visualizations. Because cyanotypes are made with shadows, you should scavenge for small objects that have a curious profile, and one way or another might point toward or open onto or explain or involve the line you have chosen. Give yourself a chance to explore a bit, and if you see something interesting, but aren’t sure how it would fit, throw it in your bag anyway—you may have a use for it, or one of your classmates might. Accra recommends these pages from Yoko Ono for general inspiration, and suggests jogging your imagination with the following categories:
- Animal (feathers, hair, chicken bones)
- Vegetal (leaves, bark, seeds/seed pods)
- Machine (plastic shopping bag, fan blade, fork)
- Earth (water)
You can also write and paint on the acrylic surface, and we will have sharpies, white-out, gesso, paint brushes etc. for the purpose.
Ordinarily each exercise is accompanied by a brief prose essay describing the thinking behind it. In this case, since we will be completing the exercise in class, that essay (300-500 words) should be submitted by 5 PM on Sunday, as usual, but should take the form of a prospectus: identifying your line, exploring what is or might be visual about it, trying out ideas for what you might do in class the next day. The essay is not a contract: if, when you get your hands on the materials, you find yourself going in an entirely different direction, so much the better.
(As usual please send the essay as a pdf (converted from Word or whatever your word processor is), named YOURLASTNAME EX 2.)
Exercise One (due 5 PM Sunday, February 6)
Make a rendition of one of the texts assigned on Wednesday or Monday (or a portion—at least four lines) that is sonically interesting, and record the result. There are many ways of realizing these simple instructions: make a short song, for whatever instrumentation; make a melody (or cadenced recitation), with yourself/and or others singing the words; find an existing piece of recorded music that can be a setting for the words, and sing or speak them over it; and so on. The point of the exercise is to think about how language and music interact, and how they find equivalences (or meaningful differences) in each other. Your exercise should be submitted by email as an audio file and accompanied by a short essay (300-500 words) describing what you have done and how it relates to the questions of the course. Please send the essay as a pdf (converted from Word or whatever your word processor is), and name both files (the audio file and the pdf) YOURLASTNAME EX 1.
