The Argument: Art V Poetry
The Argument: Art V Poetry is a collaboration between Katrina Naomi and the visual artist Tim Ridley.
In this project, The Argument: Art V Poetry, Katrina and Tim sparred to produce poetry and art. Tim began by posting an art image and Katrina had two weeks to respond with a poem, again within two weeks. They continued the process until ten pieces of work were produced: five art works, five poems.
Katrina wrote several poems in The Argument: Art V Poetry which went on to appear in her 2016 Seren collection, The Way the Crocodile Taught Me.
For more about Tim Ridley click here
November 3rd, 2014
Film V. Poetry • 1st Poem: Anti Ambient
This is the first in the Film V. Poetry collaboration.
The artist Tim Ridley has two weeks in which to respond to this poem with a short film. Tim’s film will be posted up here on Mon 17 November. Katrina will then have two weeks to respond to Tim’s film.
Tim and Katrina will continue responding to each other’s work in this way until they have a sequence of five poems and five films.
Anti-
ambient
A joy of noise
like a whole fucking Motörhead
splitting the monochrome
sparking a choice
of dark or light
a crossing revelling
in a migraine
of sound
The shadow
self asserts
stepping out
of the gunsmoke
ignoring the safety of grey
There are different ways to live
(Katrina Naomi. First published in Poetry London, No. 78, 2014)
November 3rd, 2014
Film V. Poetry – 1st film : ‘dark & light’
Here is Tim Ridley’s first film ‘dark & light’ in the Film V. Poetry collaboration.
This is in response to Katrina’s poem ‘Anti- ambient’ . Katrina now has two weeks in which to respond to this film with a poem. Katrina’s poem will be posted up here on Mon 1 December. Tim will then have two weeks to respond to Katrina’s poem.
Tim and Katrina will continue responding to each other’s work in this way until they have a sequence of five poems and five films.
December 1st, 2014
Film V. Poetry • 2nd Poem: A life in fireworks (part 1)
This is the second poem in the collaboration ‘Film V. Poetry’ in response to Tim Ridley’s film ‘dark and light’. Tim now has two weeks to respond to this poem. His film will be posted on Mon 15 December, when Katrina will write another poem. Tim and Katrina will continue responding to each other’s work in this way until they have a sequence of five poems and five films.
(Fallas is a noisy fiesta held every March in Valencia. It ends with a huge bonfire and fireworks display. Fuegos artificiales is Spanish for fireworks.)
A Life in fireworks (part 1)
*
A small composer writes
the same letters over
and over Her name dies
like excitement in the air
*
At the Aqua Club Bonfire Nite
she looks out to dark sand broken
beach huts heaped into a triangle
With the first frisson of pinks and greens
fear and anticipation mingle
in a sweaty plastic pint
*
The Plaza del Ayuntamiento’s alight
Fallas’s flames reach for white balconies
She loves the lurex of the fuegos artificiales
the shattering of a square’s easy night
*
The South Bank’s chants
PISS OFF THATCHER
rival the tolling of rockets at the end
of the GLC She cries
at the colours over Westminster
And after silence
bursts her ears
(Katrina Naomi. First published in Poetry London, No. 78, 2014)
January 12th, 2015
Film V. Poetry – 2nd film : ‘Learning to enjoy the silence’
Here is Tim Ridley’s second film, ‘Learning to enjoy the silence’, made in response to Katrina’s poem ‘My Life in Fireworks (Part 1)’.
january 12th, 2015
Film V. Poetry • 3rd Poem: zennor rising
This is the third poem from Katrina in the Film V Poetry collaboration with visual artist Tim Ridley. Tim’s film response will be posted here on 19 January 2015. Katrina then has two weeks to react to Tim’s film with a new poem.
Zennor Rising
A bumblebee tug
of buzzing cord
in the gurning loop
of welcome
I wait
suspended
until the new tongue speaks
its clang and deafen
I rise
like a shoddy angel
All I see is new
up with the cold stare of bells
to the moors and cliffs
the fish-scale slate
on the Tinners Arms
I ring a half-remembered language
from a gargoyle’s grin
Rooks scatter
like an omen
cursing across the fields
January 18th, 2015
Film V. Poetry – 3rd film : ‘Rooks | bus station’
Tim’s new film in the ‘Film V. Poetry’ collaboration is ‘Rooks/bus station’. This short film is in response to Katrina’s poem ‘Zennor Rising’. Katrina has 2 weeks to write a poem in response to this film. Katrina’s new poem will be posted on Monday 2 February.
February 2nd, 2015
Film V. Poetry • 4th Poem: London: A Reply
London: A Reply’ is part of an ongoing collaboration #filmvpoetry between Katrina and the visual artist Tim Ridley. ‘London: A Reply’ was written in 2 weeks in response to Tim’s film ‘Rooks/bus station’. Tim has 2 weeks to make a new short film in response to Katrina’s poem. Tim’s new film will be posted here on Monday 16 Feb.
London: A Reply
A year on, and I can’t hear you.
You have left me, dear London,
like I left you. I could break this tiff,
walk the seven minutes to your big white bus
climb aboard with a spotted hankie on a stick.
I know you’ve tried, you’ve sent me
images through the ether: Soho
early morning, Hyde Park in the sun,
Charing Cross Road’s bookshops
(before the chain of dull cafés),
but in this reaching out, you’ve made yourself
so much quieter, perhaps in the way
two people mirror each other,
adjusting the tilt of their heads,
how they move their arms, take on accents.
Yours is a kind of wooing, dear London,
and while I cried and cried at leaving you,
you’d taken on airs, become grandiose
with the possibilities of capital. And I saw
something new, somewhere I’d visited
long ago on a rainy night, playing pool
in a pub near the bus station.
Had I lost the game that night, perhaps
I’d never have come here –
that’s how decisions are made. I’m sorry,
dear London, it’s over. But you’ll go on
reinventing yourself, building taller,
as if you could see me from one of your towers.
February 16th, 2015
Film V. Poetry – 4th film : ‘Echoes of London’
Here is Tim Ridley’s fourth film, ‘Echoes of London’ as part of the ‘Film V. Poetry’ collaboration. Katrina has until Mon 2 March to write a film in response, which will be posted here. Tim’s film is in response to Katrina’s poem ‘London: A Response’.
February 2nd, 2015
Film V. Poetry • 4th Poem: London: A Reply
This poem is the final poem in the Film V. Poetry collaboration with the visual artist, Tim Ridley. Tim now has 2 weeks, until Monday 16 March to make a short film in response to this poem.
Concrete is My Least Favourite Colour
This side of the wall
is sun and shade and shadow
a clumsy narrative
like that Javanese puppet show
I couldn’t quite follow
On the other side a lion
is camouflaged on a beach
And you remind me
that a beach at times is not a beach
Is sea
March 11th, 2015
Film V. Poetry – Final movie : ‘We are all animals’
Here is Tim Ridley’s final film, ‘We are all animals’, in response to Katrina’s poem ‘Concrete is my least favourite colour’.
Tim’s film concludes the collaboration Film V. Poetry.
