A note on : The first National Gallery event of 2024

A fitting way to begin a triptych of brilliant events at the National Gallery Lates in 2024, flanked by fellow poet David Spittle and students Danica Ignacio and Monica Nathalal, led by art historian and author Fiona Alderton, and given the chance by curator Joseph Kendra. January 19th 2024

Again I felt curiously relaxed, almost transforming into some sort of yellow liquid, reading my poems. Fiona remarked, kindly, and lucidly, that these events have been notable for their playfulness. The audience and poets alike were happy to be there, and again nearly 100 people in attendance. www.stevenjfowler.com/nationalgallery/

A note on : Goodbye to Iklectik, improvising with Benedict Taylor

Iklectik Artlab has been one of the great London venues of my time performing over the last decade. Eduard & Isa, who created it and ran it, are amazing people. It's so sad to say goodbye, for now, for this location. We all hope the project continues elsewhere.

Iklectik has not only been a place where I have curated dozens of events, but also a place I have performed a lot, and learnt a lot. It’s one of the places where I started to move deeper into the experimental music world, through sound poetry first, and now improvised talking performances. My collaboration there with Jaap Blonk and Phil Minton is one of many memories.

Benedict Taylor and I tried to offer a sendoff to Iklectik in proper style on January 12th 2024, a night for Resonant FM, and one of the final seven days of events that was put on to say farewell. As ever before, Benedict and I planned nothing, and tried to really react to what was around us, what came out, and what had been said / surrounding us on that night.

The reaction was quite something. I think an audience of musicians and composers is different to my usual audience, but also the febrile feeling of the circumstance. Some really nice return from this below.

Pre-order - Crocodile Tear Waterfalls : selected uncollected visual poems

Crocodile Tear Waterfalls presents the selected, uncollected visual poems of SJ Fowler, featuring a range of visual poems created between 2011 and 2023. https://penteractpress.com/store/crocodile-tear-waterfalls-sj-fowler

Really happy to share news of my latest publication, now available for pre-order before a February release, and once again with the brilliant Penteract Press. It’s my third publication with the press, which has done really original and excellent things for British, and world, innovative, visual, constraint poetry.

This is a beautiful small publication, 10 x 15cm or thereabouts, good for the pocket, 40 pages, with 32 visual poems and an essay. The poems are really drawn from a wide range of my visual poetry work across 12 years.

The National Gallery : January 19th

The first of a series of performances I'll be giving at National Gallery in 2024, following three events in 2023. A mix of ekphrastic poetry and art-lectures in miniature, this succinct gallery tour and collaboration with National Gallery guides also includes students from Kingston University. Please join us, free, on Friday January 19th at 7pm. 

https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/events/friday-lates-tour-and-poetry-readings-sj-fowler-19-01-2024 

"For centuries, the artforms of painting and poetry have been in dialogue, each informing the other, or attempting to translate what makes them unique as their own media into another. Following a series of Friday Lates events last year, poet and performer SJ Fowler returns to the gallery to read new ekphrastic poems written about chosen paintings in our collection, offering alternative interpretations of their meaning, history and standing. Fowler is joined by Gallery Educator Fiona Alderton alongside invited guests from Writers’ Kingston, students and staff from Kingston University, as well as further afield, for a tour and poetry performances around the Gallery. Performers include Danica Ignacio, Monica Nathalal and David Spittle."

www.stevenjfowler.com/nationalgallery

A note on : Nora Lune films Live from Bern

Cool to have a second piece of footage, filmed by artist filmmaker Nora Lune, of my improvised performance in Bern at the end of 2023. The piece seemed to bring together a lot of what Ive been working on over the last few years in performance - talking quicker than thinking, talking as a kind of instrument, the limits of pure improvisation, found text from conversations, tangents and derivations, interactivity etc.

A note on : Budokuz issue 21 - map poems

https://www.buzdokuz.com/2021/11/buzdokuz-21-sayi/

really cool to have a new visual poem in the latest issue of turkish avant garde journal Budokuz

the poem featured is my ‘cartographic voynich’ using the voynich manuscript, which i refer to so often in my teaching, as a photobase.

this poem also features in my upcoming pamphlet with penteract press ‘crocodile tear waterfalls : selected uncollected visual poems 2011 to 2023

Published : A Seasons of Seasons, with Jules Sprake, from Sampson Low

A Seasons of Seasons

See below for more on the book and it’s first launch… buy it here for just five pounds https://sampsonlow.co/2023/12/12/a-seasons-of-seasons-sj-fowler-jules-sprake/

On the publication - A unique document in experimental poetry that celebrates the bone deep passion and pain football inflicts upon its followers. Written ostensibly to follow the turbulent 2022 / 2023 premier league season from the perspective of two lifelong fans of Crystal Palace and Everton respectively, A Seasons of Seasons then spirals out in the mass language ether of the world's most popular game. Unusual for it's methodology as well as its content, dragging in British poetry revival stalwarts alongside Pier Paolo Pasolini, Roy Hodgson and Sean Dyche, the book is a fusion of poetry, found text, collage, illustration, redaction and ground up collaboration. 

"Football, like poetry, is an artform that not so much encourages obsession as demands it. The back and forth between Fowler and Sprake perfectly captures this baroque particularity. Talking about football with a poet is usually like talking about tofu with a mountain lion: they know what it is, but they don’t see how it applies to them. So it’s a pleasure to read A Seasons of Seasons, a text, at last, for the intersection of the Venn diagram, perfect for a cold, wet Tuesday night in Stoke." Tom Jenks

A SEASONS OF SEASONS : LAUNCH 1
at Writers Kingston event #69 : Football and Literature event
Kingston University Town House - December Tuesday 12th 2023

The game of games, the great game, the beautiful ball game - a night of weird and heartfelt literary celebration! Writers of all kits shared poetry, fiction, non-fiction and performance on the world’s most popular sport, in all its facets, from the abstract to the obvious. With local and visiting writers alongside students and staff of Kingston University, this was a memorable night in the RIBA award winning Town House in Kingston. Featuring Jules Sprake and SJ Fowler / Tom Jenks / Peter Dunkley and Ian Brady / Matt Sokulsky / Marcia Knight Latter / Julia Rose Lewis / Safia Kamel. https://www.writerskingston.com/football/

A note on : The Best Typographic Moments of the Year - Guillaume!

Very cool https://lbbonline.com/news/lovely-letters-the-best-typographic-moments-of-the-year

We’re constantly surrounded by letters. And not just those that you’re reading right now or on the news, but ones that are beautifully crafted, carry character and wit, and are full of emotive storytelling. That’s right, letters can tell stories not only with what they’re telling us but with how they look… At Little Black Book, we are suckers for beautiful visual design, particularly when it comes to lettering. That’s why we decided to speak to typers and visual nerds from across the industry to find out more about the best and most eye-catching moments of the year.

A note on : Live from Bern, a talking poem

Entirely improvised, live and from scratch, a talking poem performance commissioned by, and performed at, the Bone Wort festival 2023 in Bern, Switzerland. Curated by Regina Durig. November 25th 2023. Photos by Anouk el Gabri.

A note on : a special Camarade

A very special night for me at the amazing Iklectik Artlab, which we will all miss terribly if it does indeed close in early 2024 as the landlords threaten it will. Save Iklectik https://www.iklectik.org/saveiklectik. 10 performances marked the night, one I will always remember. Nice pictures below with dear friends.

A note on : European Poetry Festival Camarade!

Huge crowd, unexpectedly so, nearly 100 people came to the see the interim collaborative camarade event for my festival, The European Poetry Festival, at Rich Mix in Bethnal Green, London. As ever before, the event had new works made by pairs of poets, many old hats, many new to it and my events. Some real highlights, and all documented on the event page here https://www.europeanpoetryfestival.com/wintercamarade

For my part I had the pleasure of working again with close friend and musician maestro Benedict Taylor. We have now a very accurate sympatico, being our 7th or 8th full scratch improvisation together in the last few years. It was a really neat 4 minutes i think.

A note on : Launching The Hyphen is a Dagger at St Bride

A very special night launching a letterpress rarity made by Pat Randle, Angie Butler and myself - The Hyphen is a Dagger, Guillaume IX troubadour crusader, and available now to buy here https://www.nomadletterpress.com/guillaume

This edition of 80 copies have been printed during 2023.
60 numbered copies have been covered using Fabriano paper and stitch-sewn.
20 further copies, marked I - XX, have been case-bound by Roger Grech.

St Bride is a venerable institution and it felt like the right place to launch such a special publication. The night began with performances by Jules Sprake and Simon Tyrrell before we screened a short film I made during the making of process of the publication. Then Angie, myself and Pat gave short talks followed by a conversation and a questions session, helped by Simon. The videos below show the talks and the chat, which all seemed to go really well.

What was emphasised here was the role printers and poets can play in synthesising their collaborations, and how vital friendship is to such a unique and demanding process. And the latter was why this was so nice, in this lovely venue, supporting by the St Bride staff, and watched online as well with their high tech streaming setup. Guillaume is out in the world now, and this night marked that.

A note on : The Aleph anthology

A truly unique anthology in parts from the mysterious and brilliant The Aleph.

I have in it a postcard of a meme poem taken from recently attracted reality influencers. A postcard meme poem with chris morris and al swearengen on it. Happy to be in this packet.

https://thealeph.limitedrun.com/products/748637-the-aleph-anthology-ii

Anthology includes; contents sheet, bookmark, 4x digital prints, 3x screen prints, 2x pamphlets, 1x letter & envelope, 1x journal, 1x screen printed cover/poster.

Edition of 100 (20 artist copies)

ALL PROFITS WILL BE DONATED TO MSF (https://msf.org.uk/

Gullfinger!

Gullfinger by SJ Fowler and Bård Torgersen from Hærverk Forlag

My latest collaborative collection has been published in Norway by Hærverk Forlag. A full colour limited edition poetry and photopoetry odyssey. It is my second work with Norwegian writer performer Bård Torgersen. The book was launched with a performance in Oslo, video below, a real 45 minute long juicy mess, like the book itself. Only 20 copies are for sale in the UK, all signed, available here! https://stevenjfowler.bigcartel.com/product/gullfinger 

A note on : Stony Thursday Book 2023 - collaboration with Zuzana Husarova

Superb to have a new collaboration in the latest edition of https://www.limerick.ie/ ‘s Stony Thursday Book publication, edited by Christodoulos Makris, one of the most interesting and active poets in Europe.

The work in the book is by Zuzana Husarova and I, entitled we haven’t performed. The poem was written for a recent performance at the european poetry festival at Iklectik Artlab, where the words, which we both felt emerged naturally and with some resonance, took a back seat to the nature of our performance. Hence we sought a home for it in print, and none better than in this book.

A note on : Seeing in Tongues, an anthology of visual poetry

James Knight, the brilliant poet and writer, has put together an extraordinary anthology of visual poetry from across the world. Released with his press Steel Incisors, it is entitled Seeing in Tongues, and is available here https://www.steelincisors.com/s/stories/seeing-in-tongues-an-anthology-of-visual-poetry

An anthology of contemporary visual poetry, representing the extraordinary richness and diversity of a particularly vibrant hybrid form. The 350-page book includes pieces made from physical materials, digitally constructed work, and hybrids of the two, and encompasses collage, cut-up, erasure, asemic writing, painting, photography, glitch, drawing, aleatory processes, and numerous other techniques.

Lots of friends have work in there including Susie Campbell, Theodoros Chiotis, Madelaine Culver, Emma Filtness, Sylee Gore, Victoria Kaye, Dan Power, Imogen Reid, Stephen Sunderland, Michael Sutton, Simon Tyrrell, Martin Wakefield & Bob Modem and many more.

My four pieces in the book are all versions of past works made new or unpublished before, and each is very different from the last.

A note on : Writers Kingston Poem Brut and Joby Pool

A huge poem brut performance literature event in Kingston, with 17 performances. All videos are up here https://www.writerskingston.com/#/poembrut23/ The event featured two sections,debut or early career poets and poets in the new steel incisors anthology Seeing in tongues. The former, many were my students, the latter many friends old and new. Some proper weird and wonderful stuff.

For my own part I performed with Joby Pool, a snow leopard, witnessing him with bouncy balls.