Vol. 7 No. 1 (2019): Experimental Poetry Networks: Material Circulations

The 1950s Neo-Avant-Gardes experimented for the first time with artistic-poetic artefacts that transcended and challenged definitions and limits of literature and visual arts. Concrete Poetry became an international movement that worked upon the experimental writing heritage of icons such as Mallarmé, Joyce and Cummings integrating visual and material practices into poetry. During the 1970s and 1980s experimental poetry evolved as an international and also highly collaborative practice ranging from visual, sound and installation to performative formats. The reception of these radical poetic practices also oscillates between literature and art: poems appear often in magazines with highly experimental formats or are exhibited in galleries as artworks, performances or happenings.

Strikingly, experimental poetry proliferated in politically contrarian climates and sought for global connection. The chasm between technological modernization and extreme social inequality was a visible expression of such contradictions, especially in Latin America. Societies were flooded with industrially produced goods to which only a small part of the population had access. Radio, TV and color print media increased the circulation of information while repressive regimes in many Latin American countries, the Iberian Peninsula and Eastern Europe practiced a harsh censorship. Yet, the experimental practices also became a strong current in democratic western European countries, such as Italy, France and the Netherlands where the use of new materials and the exchange with international colleagues came into focus.

During these years, experimental poetry overlapped largely, with mail art and even established the first mail art circles in Latin America. Poetry’s entanglement with its material and technological media became an essential characteristic. The Xerox copy, for example, became an important technological medium for experimental poetic practices. From the mid-1990s on, experimental poetry increasingly explored the possibilities of the digital. Yet, we find up until today analogue practices that intervene on the physical material, such as Carlito Azevedo’s Manual da Pedra (2013) or Daniel Monteiro’s Rodapé Literário (2013).

Pauline Bachmann (Universität Zürich)
Jasmin Wrobel (Freie Universität Berlin)