SPEAKER: How to
make a visual poem.
Poetry used to be memorized
and spoken out loud.
And then people started
writing it down.
Nowadays, you're probably
familiar with poetry
that looks like this.
But there are many more
ways to create poetry.
Check out this poem titled
"The Black Automaton
in Tag, Refugee" by contemporary
Los Angeles poet Douglas
Kearney.
Here he enlarges, tilts,
and overlaps each letter.
Notice the way some
lines stand out
because of their font
style, size, and placement.
These are quotes.
Kearney appropriates
popular song lyrics
by Eminem, Rakim, and
Digital Underground.
Why do you think the poet would
display the lyrics this way?
Take something you
wrote recently.
It could be a note
or a text message.
Break up the text somehow.
You could rewrite it, print
it out, and cut it up.
Put the words back
together to create a poem.
How can you alter the
words to emphasize
important parts of the poem?
Artists who first created poetry
this way broke a lot of rules.
In the 1920s, a movement of
artists and writers in Europe
called Dadaists
rejected what people
thought poetry should be.
While others wrote in
traditional poetic forms,
the Dadaists would cut
up words and use chance
to put them together.
Here's another example of
visual poetry by Italian writer
and artist Ardengo Soffici,
who was considered a part
of the Futurist movement.
Futurists, like the Dadaists,
reacted against tradition.
They believed the shapes
of letters and words
were important parts
of a poem's meaning.
This is part of a series by
contemporary artist Carrie Mae
Weems, titled, "From Here I
Saw What Happened And I Cried."
Weems appropriated
photographs depicting slavery
from the mid 1800s as well as
contemporary African American
portraits.
The artist enlarged and
re-printed the photographs
in red and re-framed
them using glass
etched with her own words.
Weems juxtaposes the text and
image to create something new.
Because of the changes, how
do you experience the portrait
differently?
Take a photograph
that's important to you
and transform it.
Next, juxtapose the image
with your own words.
Say something important
about your photograph.
What do we not know about it?
Another photographer who
plays with juxtaposition
is Kansuke Yamamoto.
Yamamoto was a poet
and artist, and he
referred to his dreamlike
photographs as visual poetry.
Yamamoto didn't have
the luxury of a computer
to alter his images.
Instead, he
manipulated negatives
in a photography darkroom.
He also used collage
techniques to create
unexpected juxtapositions.
The title of this
photograph comes
from a poem called,
"I Wish I Were
Thinking in the Body of a Horse"
by a writer named Hideo Oguma.
So not only did Yamamoto
consider his work
visual poetry, but he also
referenced poets and poetry
in his titles.
Why do you think Yamamoto
referred to his photographs
as visual poetry?
What makes this
work a visual poem?
Let's try creating a
visual poem like his.
Cut out images you like from
photographs and magazines
or use digital pictures
that you've taken.
Combine pictures in a
way that you would never
see in real life.
Give the work a title with words
selected from a favorite quote,
film, or poem.
How does a borrowed title change
the meaning of a work of art?
So what counts as
the visual poem?
Take a look at Yamamoto's
visual poem next to an image
by an artist who greatly
influenced him, Man Ray.
Is this photograph
also a visual poem?
Where else do you
see visual poetry?
Where do you see visual
poetry in your life?
