Winslow Homer, Georgia O’Keeffe, Stephen Hannock Monday, Jun 30 2008 

art and ekphrasis and painting and poetry and watercolor poetryaboutart 5:52 pm

Congratulations to local poet Alan Catlin, whose ekphrastic poem “Girl with Red Stockings 1882″ is published in the Spring/Summer 2008 issue of The Aurorean. The poem was inspired by a watercolor (with graphite pencil on paper) by Winslow Homer.

Several of Alan’s other poems about artists/artworks have been published in recent issues of Chronogram:

“O’Keeffe Requirements” (October 2007 issue): Georgia O’Keeffe

“The Arduous Nowhere” (October 2007 issue): Stephen Hannock

“The Artist’s Studio in Afternoon Fog 1894″ (April 2008 issue): Winslow Homer

 

(See also this blog’s entry devoted to Alan Catlin, dated April 5, 2008. See also Alan Catlin’s O’Keeffe Equivalents online chapbook at Origami Condom.)

 

Braque, Cezanne, Pissarro, Van Gogh Tuesday, May 27 2008 

art and digital image and drawing and ekphrasis and painting and poetry and watercolor poetryaboutart 11:32 am

When you see the phrase “still life,” what comes to your mind? Now that I’ve read the very engaging and inventive poems in Matthew Hittinger’s chapbook Pear Slip, I think primarily of pears. This award-winning chapbook (Spire Press, 2007) compiles eight poems, plus a preface entitled “Pear Poetics,” which consider pears from several angles: as a subject of art (oil painting, drawing, watercolor); as a canned or crated commodity; as the often-neglected cousin of the apple; and as an embodiment of the shapely forms of his own poems as they peel down a page. His individual poems are linked not only thematically, but also linguistically. Mr. Hittinger plays with the various homophones and translations of the noun “pear”: to “pare” a piece of fruit; pome (French or Latin for the pear-like “apple” and also a homophone for “poem”); and a “pair” of lovers.

Some aspects of the poet’s ekphrasis are unique; at least, I’ve seen them in no other ekphrastic poem. First, one of his poems responds to the digital wallpaper on a laptop display, an image which he describes as “a stolen painting by Braque.” Secondly, another of his poems responds to the “Untitled” assignation of a painting in a museum.

The blurb on the back cover praises the chapbook as “a fertile concoction. . .wonderful. . .a sustained and disciplined act of fancy” (Linda Gregerson). I agree entirely.

The works of art which inspired the poems in this collection are:

BRAQUE, Georges. Fruit Dish (oil painting)

CEZANNE, Paul. Trois Poires (watercolor and pencil work); and Pots of Flowers and Pears (oil painting)

PISSARRO, Camille. Still Life: Apples and Pears in a Round Basket (oil painting)

VAN GOGH, Vincent. Still Life with Grapes, Pears and Lemons; and Still Life with Grapes, Apples, Pear and Lemons; and Still Life with Pears (all oil paintings)