Please join us in St. Catharines, ON for a Roundtable Discussion on Contemporary Poetics, led by Steve McCaffery (Buffalo, NY), Karen Mac Cormack (Buffalo, NY), derek beaulieu (Calgary, AB), kevin mcpherson eckhoff (Kelowna, BC), Gary Barwin (Hamilton, ON), bill bissett (Toronto/Lunaria, ON/?), and Honey Novik (Toronto, ON), and hosted by local poet and professor Gregory Betts. Coffee and snacks will be provided.

Where: The Niagara Artists’ Centre, 354 St. Paul Street
When: 10am Saturday 12 March 2011
Cost: Free, courtesy the Department of English Language and Literature, Brock University

Eric Schmaltz at the Grey Borders Reading Series has interviewed me in advance of the Bird is the Word exhibition and perfrmance at the Niagara Arts Centre. I’ll be St.Catharines, ON March 11-13 for a series of readings, talks and round-tables in association with the exhibition…

Zswound (a blog dedicated to heteroglossia, mixed speech, hybridization, distortion, glossolalia, linguistic mestizaje, slang, frontier-words, pop translation, dysfunctional or diverted translation, stolen languages, […]) has recently reviewed Local Colour here.

As part of the opening celebrations for “Bird is the Word” exhibition in St.Catharines this Spring, Gary Barwin will be performing a musical interpretation of my novel Local Colour. He has created a musical score (a page of which is excerpted on the left) ,where the Y axis is time; X axis is pitch. An excerpt from Gary’s “Local Colour” work-in-progress is available here.

Gary’s work can be found extensively online, including his Doctoral dissertation “Martin’s Idea“

On display from 9 March – 4 June 2011

Niagara Artists Centre
354 St.Paul Street,
St. Catharines, ON, Canada

The Bird is the Word
derek beaulieu • bill bissett • Judith Copithorne • kevin mcpherson eckhoff • Marinko Jareb • Travis Kirton • Kelly Mark • Steve McCaffery • a.rawlings • Laurel Woodcock • Hallie Siegel & Matthew Donovan & Gregory Betts

Opening Reception Friday 11 March 7pm
Readings beginning at 8pm by derek beaulieu, bill bissett & Honey Novick, a.rawlings, kevin mcpherson eckoff and Steve McCaffery & Jeremy Lessard. Musical Performance by Gary Barwin
This exhibit explores the territory where language and visual art intersect through the work of writers and artists. This common (play)ground has been covered by Concrete Poets, Cubists, Dadaists, Futurists, and Surrealists among others. Expanding semantic expression beyond the conventional structures of language includes the exploration of typography as imagery and engages philosophy, semiotics, and political and social commentary. The Bird is the Word will feature six poets and six visual artists from across Canada delving into the conceptual, spatial, and material presence of the written word. It showcases a multiplicity of media and disciplines including video projection, onsite installation, collage, sculpture, and micrography.

I am honoured to be named one of Broken Pencil‘s “50 Favourite Indie Arts People and Places” (I assume i’m one of the people and not a place… see article at left).

Boog City and d.a. levy lives: celebrating the renegade press

presents an evening with No Press

Tues., March 29, 6:00 p.m. sharp, free

ACA Galleries
529 W. 20th St., 5th Flr.
NYC

Featuring readings from

Kevin McPherson Eckhoff
Rob Fitterman
Charles Gute
Jake Kennedy
Rachel Zolf

and music from Rorie Kelly

There will be wine, cheese, and crackers, too.

——
Directions:
C/E to 23rd St., 1/9 to 18th St.
Venue is bet. 10th and 11th avenues

The entirety of “A Future for the Novel (2011)” can be downloaded as a PDF here: A Future for the Novel.

The Poetry Foundation‘s Harriet blog has a quick mention of Local Colour (“the prettiest PDF you’ll look at all day”), but sadly demonstrates a lack of understanding about Canadian spelling…

My conceptual novel Local Colour (ntamo, 2008) is now available online at Craig Dworkin’s “eclipse” archive as a downloadable PDF.

Local Colour is a page-by-page interpretation of Paul Auster’s 72–page novella Ghosts. Ghosts concerns itself with Blue, a private detective hired by a mysterious character named White to transcribe the actions of Black, a denizen of Brooklyn Heights. As Blue reports his findings, the reader becomes more aware of the intricate relationship between Black and White, and a tactile awareness of the role of colour spreads through the narrative.
Local Colour removes the entirety of Auster’s text, leaving only chromatic words—proper nouns or not—spread across the page as dollops of paint on a palette. What remains is the written equivalent of ambient music—words which are meant to seen but not read. The colours, through repetition, build a suspense and crescendo which is loosened from traditional narrative into a more pixellated construction.