A note on: The University Camarade III was brilliant

A very special evening at the rich mix, the third time ive put this event together, with students from all over the UK. As ever, collaboration absolutely engenders friendships while producing challenging, idiosyncratic poetry. The students involved were universally excellent, brave, bold and the evening left a real impression on the audience, and I think, I hope, on the rest of their poetry / writing / performing lives. I believe sincerely that opportunity is what shapes people's journey and growth, and this event gives people young in their experience a real urge to go into new spaces. 

I was especially content with the showing of my students, who we and are markedly their own, which is all I want from them, to expand and explore their own paths, with some erratic guidance www.theenemiesproject.com/unicamarade / www.writerscentrekingston.com/richmix

Published: Animal Waste

Animal Waste : The second of a set of five cinema-poetic collaborations with the artist-filmmaker Joshua Alexander.

Animal Waste spreads itself over the lands of London which seem to have inspired a re-understanding of the city's literary and psychological history, from Limehouse to Wapping, Rotherhithe to Ratcliff. Mutely nodding to this profound and now taken for granted reexamination of these once were slums, Animal Waste sets itself against the confident and touristic glean of that history, instead aligning itself with the suffering sediment of the actual past. Shot around Wellclose Sq and Hawksmoor's St Anne's, and hiding from the Thames, the film evokes Falk, Swedenborg, Linneaus in all their intelligent menace.

'Manichean visions revive disputed and despoiled London ground. Poetry in light and stone' Iain Sinclair

The animal films explore the particular, baffled and morbid character of English attitudes to mortality, along with the specific influence of place and conformity on the quintessentially English deferral of emotion and melodrama. The films aim to capture the ambiguous menace of an often accidentally humorous resolve, manner, apology and understatement so prevalent in the English character. 

Published: a subcritical test in Poetry Ireland

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Trumpet Issue 7 / Winter 2017/18
Roger McGough celebrates the fiftieth birthday of The Mersey Sound, still one of the best-selling poetry anthologies of all time; Duke Special writes about putting Michael Longley to music. Máighréad Medbh uses fragments of the everyday to compose her poem 'The 2nd of April'; Noel Duffy explores the literary device which makes a poem quintessentially a poem: the line break. Grace Wilentz reviews six of the best pamphlets;  John W Sexton reviews The Poetry of Pop. Other contributors include Tara Bergin, Sue Rainsford, Aifric Mac Aodha, Elaine Cosgrove, Ailbhe Darcy and SJ Fowler.  

http://www.poetryireland.ie/publications/trumpet/current-issue/

Published: Aletta Ocean's Alphabet Empire

I'm happy to announce the release of my new art book, from Hesterglock Press, released in limited-edition hardback first-print of just 40 copies, 20 of which have sold so far. The book is available to purchase here - Aletta Ocean's Alphabet Empire from my bigcartel page.

"A book that asks, abstractly, are letters shaped like bodies? Can words evoke faces, captured in a screen? Who, or what, is assimilating, who or what? Aletta Ocean's Alphabet Empire is a collection of art poems, hand wrought in black, grey, silver and white, fashioned with indian ink, paint and pen, worked with techniques that edge around writing, vying with abstraction, constantly harrying semantic meaning and legibility. 

Five years in the making, conceptually this is a book about sex, poetry and pornography and the disconnect between the former and the latter. These pages explore technology in its absence and aim to evidence the power of materiality and the body, and our hands, that are still required for touch."

"Searching AOAE online (Aletta Ocean's Alphabet Empire) shows a YouTube clip of Japanese cats mating. What's a word in any case if not a monster? A monster that eats words. The toner explodes on the office carpet spilling out a perfectly formed oeuvre. Serifs skywrite like migrating gannets. The rorschach accidentally tells you what to think. The printed facsimile becomes original when the world goes JavaScript. The dollar sign is a duck walking backwards into a lake. The ATM dispenses glyphs. How do we know people have faces when they take the day off work? The tank rolls over the charcoal leaving a map of Iraq or a new version of Cathay. We're back in the world of Artaud's final journal where, thank fuck (and at last) we're not being told what to think. Aletta Ocean's Alphabet Empire is an almighty triumph, a well-earned relief. Picasso said it took a lifetime to learn to paint like a child. Or, for that matter, like the mad." Chris McCabe

A note on: reading boxing poems at Cambridge University

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A resonant experience on multiple levels, I had the chance to read at Cambridge Uni thanks to Oliver Goldstein and his Sweet Science event in the Faculty of English. It was another entry in my experience of a small, welcoming community of writers and poets who care passionately about the sport and aim to reflect it in works as complex as the culture itself. Oliver is one of the world's leading boxing journalists and really fine poet, and as well he and I, there were multiple excellent readers and a really healthy and interested audience. Discerning you'd expect, but friendly with it too. I read some poems from an upcoming book, a sequel to my 2011 Fights, entitled Rematches, due out with Kingston University Press this year. I also got the chance to pop a balloon with a left hook. 

Perhaps the most unexpected highlight was meeting a cambridge english undergrad who told me they were doing their dissertation on my work. A first, as far as I know, and actually really warming and encouraging, it actually really touched me. It's very easy to feel one is wasting time, serving my own interests and no one gives a shit (which is true) but then a small thing like that happens, and you feel less in a bubble.

Published: Liberating the Canon anthology ed. Isabel Waidner

So nice to be included in this anthology, with a piece of fiction, never seen the light of day before, which is part of my Museum series. https://www.dostoyevskywannabe.com/experiments/liberating_the_canon

Liberating the Canon is an edited anthology capturing the contemporary emergence of radically innovative and nonconforming forms of literature in the UK and US. Historically, sociopolitical marginalisation and avant-garde aesthetics have not come together in UK literature, counterintuitively divorcing outsider experience and formal innovation. Bringing together intersectional identity and literary innovation, LTC is designed as an intervention against the normativity of literary publishing contexts and the institution 'Innovative Literature' as such. More widely, if literature, any literature, can act as a mode of cultural resistance and help imagine a more progressive politics in Tory Britain and beyond, it is this.

Contributors

Edited by Isabel Waidner, Liberating the Canon includes contributors working at the intersections of prose, poetry, art, performance, indie publishing and various subcultural contexts:

Mojisola Adebayo, Jess Arndt (US), Jay Bernard, Richard Brammer, Victoria Brown, SJ Fowler, Juliet Jacques, Sara Jaffe (US), Roz Kaveney, R. Zamora Linmark (US), Mira Mattar, Seabright D.Mortimer, Nat Raha, Nisha Ramayya, Rosie Snajdr, Timothy Thornton, Isabel Waidner, Joanna Walsh and Eley Williams.

272 pages
ISBN: 978-1999924508
Dimensions: 5 x 8 inches
Cat No: DW-391

A note on: first commissions up on The European Review

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So far executive editing The European of Poetry, Books and Culture is pleasant pleasant, working with some really remarkable writers to shape new pieces. Online already are articles by the authors below, all of whom have produced really striking pieces, with dozens in the pipeline.

A note on: latest poetry on 3am magazine

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It's been a good time to be getting submissions for 3am's poetry section. Seems what I've been trying to do over the years has stuck a little, and so much of the work I'm getting is brilliant. So more than usual has been published, and this is in no small part down to the Poem Brut and Duos series, being the only poetry I'm accepting at the mo. As ever there's a big backlog, so much more to come soon. Since September 2017...

Published: a new essay on The Learned Pig

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As part of my new series of art book publications for Poem Brut I've written a series of essays. Each one acts as a kind of contextualised full stop to the books and their otherwise un-explained content, but they aren't explanations, just ruminations. The brilliant online journal The Learned Pig have kindly published the essay On Time and Mess, which closed out I fear my best work behind me, with selections of the work from that book

https://www.thelearnedpig.org/on-time-and-mess/5477

Once we understand excess, then we can get really simple.

– Robert Rauschenberg

Exploring poetry’s absent indispensable character

"Because poetry is not a thing that lives, to put it mildly, upon the regulation and control of grammar and correct spelling, in the final preparations for the publication of my book, ‘I fear my best work behind me,’ an exploration of the rudimentary character of poetry – that is letters and words – there was only one correction to make for my editor. Only one deliberate error, with all the obsequiousness that this phrase entails, for him to find and for me to defend. The title. I fear my best work is behind me. Remove the is. Then perhaps, to those dozen or so reading the title, and those few within the dozen who are concentrated by interest, the absence of the is will take on its proper significance. The primary significance I would posit that poetry has, outside of letters and words, is purposeful semantic omission.

I do not imagine my best work is behind me, literally, but in those whom I’ve discovered – and that is the right word to use (for they have to be unearthed, do poets, in England) – who have given me permission to make such works as those that often litter my pages, they are behind me, and are the best work, for they were and are not making what can be mine. What they have made was original, or based on poets they have buried with themselves, as I shall not do........"

 

A note on: editing the Sampson Low Poetry Pamphlet series in 2018

The Sampson Low Poetry Pamphlet Series is designed to evidence the remarkable contemporary and innovative poetry being written by current and recent Kingston University Creative Writing students. This series of beautifully designed pamphlets each features a suite of poems, most often on one theme or in one style, by a solo author. Visit https://sampsonlow.co/wck-pamphlets/ to purchase from the series.

New releases in the series, debut works by Olga Kolesnikova, Yvonne Litschel and Silje are now available to purchase. Click on the title and author to read more about each publication so far and buy a copy!: Click on the title and author to read more about each publication so far and buy a copy!:

“Kingston University brings together students from all over the world, from as wide a range of backgrounds and cultures as can be found in the UK. It creates a community that cross pollinates influences and ideas, and this is inevitably reflected in the work the students create. The university does not get enough credit for this – it is, I have seen, a vibrant, harmonious environment where originality and difference can be transformed into exciting and innovative expression. The students are hungry for that which is innovative, that which allows them to express the true size and complexity of their experience and their community at the university. This series of poetry pamphlets reflects that. The work is utterly contemporary, it is exciting and energetic. It is, I hope, the best kind of representation of what Kingston University stands for – intelligent, unique and various in its character.”  
Series editor, SJ Fowler

A note on: Poem Brut III at Rich Mix and smashing closed my exhibition

Another remarkable night for the Poem Brut events. There is a community forming around the notion of literary performance through these events which is warm and welcoming but is producing some challenging, though often very funny, poetry. It feels, though early in the Poem Brut project which took years to begin, that the concept of the events, like with The Enemies Project, has grand potential.

The event also saw the closing of my exhibition Hard to Read. It was a privilege to have space at the Rich Mix for a whole month, but the exhibition was a collecting of previous things rather than a showing of that which is new, so I felt I needed to close it down with something memorable. 

A note on : Poem Brut 2018

This Saturday sees the first Poem Brut event of the year at Rich Mix. Three further events are confirmed for the year ahead and one exhibition, with an open call. Details below.www.poembrut.com

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Poem Brut at Rich Mix II: January Saturday 13th - 7pm onwards
Rich Mix Gallery : Free Entry (free wine too) www.poembrut.com/gallery 
35-47 Bethnal Green Rd, London E1 6LA (downstairs from the Indigo Cafe) 
Featuring brand new literary performances from Paul Hawkins, Imogen Reid, Christian Patracchini, Patrick Cosgrove, Mischa Foster Poole and more. A last chance to see my Hard to Read exhibition before it closes and a first chance to soil my book Aletta Ocean's Alphabet Empire, published by Hesterglock Press.

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Poem Brut at Rich Mix III : March Sat 17th 2018
with Chrissy Williams, Lavinia Singer, Matvei Yankelevich, Julia Rose Lewis, Julia Schuster, Olga Moskvina, Oliver Mayeux, Mischa Foster Poole, Ruhi Parmar Amin, Andre Bagoo and more. 

Poem Brut at Writers' Centre Kingston : March Thursday 22nd 2018
with Revital Cohen, Tuur Van Balen, Harry Man, Tawny Andersen, Jeramu Dodds, Sarah Dawson, Lucy Furlong & more.

Poem Brut at National Poetry Library : Wednesday June 6th 2018
with Maja Jantar, SJ Fowler, Tom Jenks, Saradha Soobrayen (TBC)

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Poem Brut, supported by Arts Council England.

A note on - Hard to Read : an exhibition at Rich Mix

HARD TO READ
Paint Poems, Poet Portraits, Pansemia : an exhibition by SJ Fowler
December 9th 2017 to january 15th 2018 at Rich Mix Gallery
www.poembrut.com/hard-to-read
35-47 Bethnal Green Rd, London E1 6LA (downstairs from the Indigo Cafe) 

Once we understand excess, then we can get really simple.
                                                                           Robert Rauschenberg

From the gallery "Collecting together the art poetry of SJ Fowler, this solo exhibition aims to pose several questions of the poem as a concrete, visual thing in the world. What is in the shape of a letter and what images do words recall? What is the meaning of colour in poetry and text upon the page, and white space? How does the situation of a poem change its meaning? Why is composition not a concept that applies to a medium that is innately visual? In literature, why has content overwhelmed context? Why has product dominated process? HARD TO READ poses these questions and answers them poorly, playfully, with over 40 original works drawn from multiple publications and previous exhibitions - works that interrogate handwriting, abstraction, illustration, asemic and pansemic writing, scribbling, crossings out, forgotten notes, strange scrawls - the odd interaction between paper and pen, and pencil, and coloured words that randomly collide with image recalling words."

Special view performance event : January Saturday 13th - Rich Mix Gallery : Free Entry - 7.30pm www.poembrut.com/gallery featuring Paul Hawkins, Imogen Reid, Christian Patracchini, Patrick Cosgrove, Mischa Foster Poole, SJ Fowler and more.

Part of Poem Brut, supported by Arts Council England.

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Pictures by Alexander Kell http://www.alexanderkell.com/

A note on: The European Review of Poetry, Books and Culture

I'm pleased to have been named an executive editor of the European Review of Poetry, Books and Culture. Over the next 12 months I'll have the chance to commission and publish over 80 original essays, articles and reflections from writers across the world. 

Initial commissions include new pieces by Rasha Abbas, Harry Man, Joanna Walsh, David Spittle, Christodoulos Makris, Andrew Gallix, Rocio Ceron, Catherine Humble and many more. New articles are soon to be published daily at www.versopolis.com

The European Review of Poetry, Books and Culture is an online literary journal, funded by the European Union, aiming to create an anglophone publication platform with a focus on continental Europe and world beyond. 

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Published : I fear my best work behind me

'm happy to announce the release of my debut art book, in a limited edition, from Stranger Press. Available to purchase here I fear my best work behind me

The book will be launched on December 15th at The Poetry Society's Poetry Cafe at 7.30pm, free entry. Details here www.poembrut.com/ifear

Produced to a remarkable standard by Stranger press, I fear ... is a book exploring poetry as a fractured, overwhelmed, handwritten victim of colour, brutalist child-like portraiture, abstract illustration and negative space. 

I'm just messin' about, Karel Appel once said. Nothing was further from the truth. 
I'm just messin' about, says SJ Fowler. Nothing is further from the truth. Bas Kwakman, Director - Poetry International Rotterdam

i fear my best work behind me presents raw simulation of tentative and tender frailty. The respondent stares at fragments of attachment comprehension lost comprehension, becomes involved in a relationship of mark facture and scripted text applied sequentially or contemporary with each other, scripted in tandem or over the smudge. It is as if the intent has been hidden and that there rests an implicit coded discrepancy in each smudge demanding a decode, a search in the rubble, a decipherment that matches the pages of fleeting uncertainty and assured presentation without transcription. The work shakes with an engagement with these conditions.     Allen Fisher poet & artist

The volume features works published by Oxford Poetry, Test Centre magazine, Gorse Magazine, Fractalia and others, and an example can be found online at Partisan Hotelhttp://partisanhotel.co.uk/S-J-Fowler The book is closed by an essay, soon to be published onThe Learned Pig.

The works call back to the post-war and latter 20th century explorations of Henri Michaux, Jacques Racquet and the CoBrA group especially – Christian Dotremont, Pierre Alechinsky, Asger Jorn, Lucebert, Gerrit Kouwenaars, Karel Appel. This book is a reconnection to their principles and practises, knowing it to be familiar ground, but one rarely tread and increasingly necessary in a still predominantly colourless medium.

Part of Poem Brut, supported by Arts Council England.

A note on : Munich with the British Council

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A few days in Munich thanks to the hospitality of Elke Ritt and the British Council in Germany, this was a chance to develop a project that I hope will become a significant moment in contemporary British innovative poetry in Europe. Proposed by myself and Chris McCabe, it centres around an exhibition of English Concrete poetry in Munich, that will trace the visual poetry revolution of the 50s through to those making the work on the island now, whom are not greatly well known beyond the UK. It will connect to German vispo too, but vitally, it will show the range of poetic practise that has emanated from visual innovation. From performance, to conceptual work, from kinetic poetry to installation. These few days were spent discussing the idea, touring the beautiful city and meeting some brilliant folk. Discovering the Lyrik Kabinett was a revelation, a library gallery event space, with a really progressive understanding of poetry and art together, and visiting the grand Literaturhaus once again reminded me of what we’re missing, not having these institutions, in the UK. Once again, I’m lucky to be working with the British Council and after this beginning, hopefully this ambitious idea comes to fruition next year.