Our Resident poet Peter Devonald in collaboration with - Alison Griffin and Joanne Cudmore…
ALISON GRIFFIN BIO
Alison Griffin_I'm Trying To Reach You
Alison Griffin graduated from Central Saint Martins with a degree in Fine Art in 2012 and has exhibited in group shows nationally and internationally, recently exhibiting with the Society of Graphic and Fine Art (SGFA) at the Mall Galleries in London in 2022 and 2021 and Cley Contemporary 21. She regularly exhibits with Cavaliero Finn in London and has been included in exhibitions at Dulwich Picture Gallery, Yinka Shonibare's Guest Projects and Oxo Tower Wharf, London. Griffin has work in private collections in Europe and the US and currently lives and works in Norfolk.
https://www.alisongriffinart.com/
https://www.instagram.com/alisongriffinart/
TEAMWORK MAKES THE DREAMWORK by Peter Devonald
Teamwork and collaboration are important
They help to put the blame on someone else.
The Infinite Monkey Theorem is a proposition that an unlimited number of monkeys, given typewriters and sufficient time, will eventually produce a particular text, such as Hamlet or even the complete works of Shakespeare.
But sadly we don’t have infinite time.
Instead, we have collaboration.
Perhaps a collaboration of monkeys can get there in half the time?
Collaboration in poetry is tricky: you can each write separate lines or stanzas, but this doesn't necessarily lead to coherence -- either thematically or stylistically. And how to rewrite when every word matters so much to each poet?
I attempted this over the last few weeks, but the effect was more gobbledegook than Shakespeare – so decided to do a collaboration with myself: the result is a 2022 version of a poem I wrote in 1992 – A FOOL’S QUESTION: how have 30 years changed my ideas, the poem, and its form?
I come from writing screenplays for a living, which is entirely collaborative - director, producer, script editor, actors, DOP, Execs, costume, and set designers, everyone has their input and impact on the script, and generally, the work is better for it.
I used to almost always work with a co-writer, because it kept it fresh, covered more ground, and enabled some sort of objectivity from at least one of us, most of the time. .357 had 85 drafts in the end with 3 writers and a lot of notes from a lot of people: sometimes collaboration means endless rewriting and confusion. In contrast, Girllikeme had 3 drafts written just by me - and was all the better for a singular vision. In the end, the UK film council (forerunner to BFI) stepped in and demanded a 15-minute version of the finished film instead of 28 minutes: it lead to lots of awards and festivals - so a very savvy call. But not all collaborations make sense, sometimes more auteur work is needed.
Artist statement: A FOOL’S QUESTION 1992/2022 – I intentionally didn’t re-read my poem before writing this, wrote more from a memory of it. It is interesting how it plays a game of hide and seek with the original, very much the same poet but largely a different person. For me, it is more optimistic now – but will be interested to see how it lands.
The original poem won an international competition and was published in an anthology: it seems so strange that when it was written we were barely even using the internet, and to send work out was literally posting it into the unknown. There seemed to be very few places to publish work – almost totally reliant on the Writers Handbook, and the Writers and Artists Handbook. I think my life would have been very different if the internet had been around then: 55 poems published in the last 8 months says it all. I hope you enjoy this interesting experiment.
Artist statement: Here are 2 poetic collaborations - STORM and A SIMPLE CHANGE - with the very talented photographer-artist designer - Joanne Cudmore - who took the photos and created the design (words by me). I love the sense of being blown away in Storm – enhanced so much by the image, increases the way the words are blown to the winds. The imaginary of A Simple Change again enhances the words and adds depth/meaning to them, a synthesis of image and meaning.
Artist statement: This poem I call: ANOTHER FALL ANOTHER PAGE - with the brilliant artist Alison Griffin – who named her wonderful art "I'm Trying To Reach You". Her intricate drawing always beguiles and amazes me, such a talent. Jonathan Jones in The Guardian called her to work ‘curious and memorable’ when he saw it at her final year show and referred to her large-scale piece ‘Behind Every Window Lies Another Hidden Story’ as a "brilliantly authoritative" drawing.
The poem came from seeing the art – the words were right there as I saw it for the first time. I love the spontaneity of poetry, it is so here, now and organic. I tried to get the beauty of the art in the poem – the complexity of stunning colour, so perfectly Autumnal.
Artwork: "I'm Trying To Reach You"
pencil and oil paint on paper
by Alison Griffin
Poetry and art are for the senses. How do the images make you feel?
PETER DEVONALD BIO
Peter Devonald is a poet in residence at Haus-a-rest, a regular columnist for Culture and Arts, and Heart Of The Heatons poetry winner. 50+ poems published / forthcoming in 2022: Artist's Responding to..., ArtLove02, Bolton Breakdown, Dear Politicians: Ecopoetry, Dirigible Balloon, Dwell Time Press, Forget-Me-Not Press x2, Greenhouse, 6 issues haus-a-rest, RIVISTA, Sixpence Society, Shallot, Spoonie, Suburban Witchcraft, Substantially Unlimited: Stigma, and Wishbone Words.
5 group shows including Tender Stems with PaintingWriting, Chronically Online Culturable Layered Onion. Featured in Poetic Map of Reading and Southwark Festival Of Words. 50+ film awards, former mentor Peter Ustinov Awards (iemmys) and Children’s Bafta nominated. Manchester-based, Peter runs monthly 8 word stories for Heaton/ Cheadle/ Didsbury Post.
https://www.instagram.com/peterdevonald/
https://www.facebook.com/pdevonald
https://twitter.com/petedevonald
JOANNE CUDMORE BIO
Joanne Cudmore enjoys capturing memories and moments, caught in time. Her work has appeared in numerous websites, calendars and cards. She looks through her lens, creates narratives and shares the stories she sees.
She conceived, managed, and realised an extraordinary campaign to raise awareness of sarcoidosis. It became a global project that spanned the entire globe. She fundraises for sarcoidosis UK through her images of the world – and continues to raise awareness:
https://photosarcoid.wixsite.com/sarcoidosis