Showing posts with label poetry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label poetry. Show all posts

Monday, October 18, 2010

Pablo Neruda's Houses

Saturday afternoon driving along in the car listening to Radio National the weekly program 'Poetica' came on! After a trip to the Botanic Gardens at Mt Coot-tha, a wonderful long conversation with one of the librarians, and time enjoying the sunshine and fresh greens of this location following a week of wind and rain a mellow mood had descended already when I tuned into 'Poetica' and was soon was transported away by the day's story on Pablo Neruda... long a favorite of mine.



One of a great many publications



It was such a pleasure to hear a favourite being read on this program and learn more on where Neruda had lived and what had some inspired some key works and developments in his life. I have included this poem below. In my previous home going back a few years now I had written the first stanza of the work  'Poesia' or 'Poetry' above the picture rail when painting deep blue/greys in this section of wall. That had curiously brought a quiet presence to the room that inspirited it somehow!


you cant read the text but you can maybe just see it above the picture rail!


Poetry

And it was at that age ... Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names,
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire,
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind. 

Pablo Neruda 


More work by Neruda can be read through this site - PoemHunter.com



Pablo Neruda's Home
Isla Negra...by the sea


The names
The rafters in Pablo Neruda's studio.
(found here)


About Pablo Neruda

Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda during a Library of Congress
recoding session, June 20, 1966

Pablo Neruda (1904-1973) held diplomatic posts in Asian and European countries. After joining the Communist Party, Neruda was elected to the Chilean Senate but was forced to live in exile in Mexico for several years. Eventually he established a permanent home on Isla Negra. In 1970 he was appointed as Chile's ambassador to France; in 1971 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.



Below is the link with text to the Saturday Program. You should be able to listen to the show for the next month... after that Im not sure. You can also click to see the images of one of the houses.



Neruda's Houses

Producer Greg Lewis with a portrait of Pablo Neruda at Isla Negra.
Pablo Neruda's Houses
View the image gallery
A feature on Neruda's eccentric homes and the poetry he wrote there.
Neruda's Houses is written and narrated by Brisbane author Greg Lewis. Greg looks at the eccentric houses the famous poet Pablo Neruda built in his native Chile: La Chascona, La Sebastiana and Isla Negra, as well as his childhood homes, and the houses he lived in while working as a diplomat in Burma in the 1920s and Spain during the civil war. We'll also hear Neruda's poems that were written in these residences or relate closely to them.
Greg Lewis turned his hand to literary commentary and poetry after many years as a boxing writer. He's written for The Hardy Society Journal, Australian Reader and Speedpoets. Greg married his wife in Chile last year and took time out from his honeymoon to visit Neruda's houses, and gather the material for this program.
Neruda's poems are read in Spanish and English by Simon Palomares.
Sound engineers: Andrea Hensing and Tom Henry
Production: Mike Ladd
List of poems:
House
Trans Gary Soto
From The Poetry of Pablo Neruda Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Poetry
Trans Alastair Reid
From Isla Negra Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Every Day, Matilde
Trans William O'Daly
From The Sea and the Bells, Copper Canyon Press
Port, this port of Valparaiso
Trans William O'Daly
From The Sea and the Bells, Copper Canyon Press
Rangoon 1927
Trans Alastair Reid
From Isla Negra, Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
I'm Explaining a Few Things
Trans Nathaniel Tarn
From Twentieth Century Latin American Poetry,
University of Texas Press
The Heights of Macchu Picchu, Part 6
Trans Nathaniel Tarn
From Twentieth Century Latin American Poetry,
University of Texas Press

[neruda.jpg]
a book written for children about the poet

another poem for you...  an excerpt:


Ode to the Dictionary 



turn

its

pages:

caporal,

capote,

what a marvel

to pronounce these plosive

syllables,

and further on,

capsule,

unfilled, awaiting ambrosia or oil

and others,

capsicum, caption, capture,

comparison, capricorn,

words

as slippery as smooth grapes,

words exploding in the light

like dormant seeds waiting

in the vaults of vocabulary,

alive again, and giving life:

once again the heart distills them.


Dictionary, you are not a

tomb, sepulcher, grave

tumulus, mausoleum,

but guard and keeper,

hidden fire,

groves of rubies,

living eternity

of essence,

depository of language.


and a last thought....read more here:

A manifesto for writing down the bones of the world.
“It is good, at certain hours of the day and night, to look closely at the world of objects at rest. Wheels that have crossed long, dusty distances with their mineral and vegetable burdens, sacks from the coal bins, barrels, and baskets, handles and hafts for the carpenter’s tool chest. From them flow the contacts of man with the earth, like a text for all troubled lyricists. The used surfaces of things, the wear that the hands give to things, the air, tragic at times, pathetic at others, of such things—all lend a curious attactiveness to the reality of the world that should not be underprized.

Saturday, August 14, 2010

clearing one's head...


Yesterday it was great to get out for a walk after some rainy grey old days. A friend and I met at Brisbane Powerhouse for the walk along the riverside pathway. Once the supplier of power to the tramway network of the city as well as suburban power it has been converted more recently and opened 10 years ago as Arts precinct.... hence the sign below which is one of 4 by artist Richard Tipping (see at end of post).







Great walking around this area....love how the Brisbane river curves around....snake-like for miles!


The Powerhouse building is well worth a visit... Saturdays twice a month it hosts a growers market on the grounds.

Brisbane Powerhouse



Feeling Power Hungry sign - New Farm Park and Powerhouse, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia 070202

Today was just as sunny and on route to the studio I stopped for coffee not far from the studio... love the city views in this area. Whoever lives in this house has a great view.




Across the road from the house above is the surprisingly ramshackle one below which incidently is one of the grooviest cafes in Brisbane. I used to stop there last year on route to the Botanic Gardens for a coffee and chat... but this year have been so busy that today was the fist visit in a long time. There's no signage out the front. I once asked what it was called and have completely forgotten because I named it 'the cafe with no name' and like to keep it as a secret destination.
Inside the walls are painted black and the seating is very relaxed ...plenty of good magazines to read and THE best coffee. There is about 3 things on the menu...all of them toast... but the best - I like the  excellent sourdough rubbed with garlic and smooshed with ripe tomato and and a splash of olive oil!
And when this town turns on the heat I can tell you sitting in this dark cave of a place is perfection...
It is seriously the most refreshing place to visit ...it rewrites all the rules...but gets the most important things really right.(and its not far from my new studio.)




OK... so what have I been painting for the last 3 days? last week I added more pages to my 'homage to the seed' journal and revisited work from a few years ago... then worked with ink on paper and reworked some older work. Basically just feeling my way into the work after a break and the relocation.
Then 3 days ago I picked up a 60 x 90 cm painting on canvas I decided I was unhappy with and completely went off in a different direction. If change is as good as a holiday... then this is the holiday I meant to take but have as yet put off. For 3 days I have listened non-stop to radio national...a lot of election reporting which has now become tedious, although I must say this election has me fascinated.


I have caught some brilliant programs - losing myself in the world of Radio National and this altogether mysterious painting below. Why I say mysterious is because it has a life of its own... I'm coming along for the ride... its dictating to me and I just shut up and follow. As I have been working on it I feel my head clearing. After 5 hugely busy months where it seemed all go, go, go.... this has been like doing a very large puzzle... the brain activity of deciding ...ok... this colour here...that line there.... its enveloped me in a way that has had the effect of clearing my head. After chaos ...the re-ordering. Probably I need to do a fair bit of this re-ordering in my home office and such...but starting here is a very enervating place to 
apply that energy.






I have no name for this yet. I know its not finished either ...but Im wondering if the finished work is as important as the process in this case. Below is a close up of a section of the work...




Whatever will be next?


Anway...back to the artist who's signage art works were shown above.... Richard Tipping. If you click on the word editorial below it will take you to the text he wrote for this Australian Art Journal. See Google images for further visuals.

The Word As Art

Editorial

Artist: Mr Richard Tipping, editorial
Richard Tipping looks at the role of text and language from an historical and contemporary context, covering areas of interest such as recent technological advancements, graffiti culture and going as far back as 46,000 years to briefly discuss some of the oldest found examples of Indigenous cave art in the south of Australia. Along the way he looks to medieval and ancient Phoenician developments, Clement Greenberg's promotion of painting as a purely optical experience, one in which text has no place except as another kind of surface, the role of Dada in claiming the relationship between word and image and discusses other important figures such as Duchamp, Brancusi, Stephane Mallarme, Christopher Brennan, Picasso, Braque, Kurt Schwitters, Charles Olson, Alex Selenitsch, Allan Riddell, Rosalie Gascoigne and many others.

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

a painter for our time and only our time...


Richard Wright: winner of this year's Turner Prize
This title was taken from a review by Jonathan Jones of the prize winner of this years Turner Prize at the Tate Britain. It refers to the ephemeral nature of this work which will be painted over at the end of the show despite the painstaking work in its creation.
Richard Wright's intricate Gold Leaf painting at this year's Turner prize
Read a wonderful post on the Turner prize winner this year by Deborah Barlow of Slow Muse. She has included 4 reviews from the UK art press. To read more on Deborah and her work click about where an interesting quote from Robert Hughes informs the idea of slow in relation to art. Deborah's posts consistently stimulate further thinking long after reading them. There is gravitas and a depth of engagement as befits the title Slow Muse.
I just found this particular translation of a poem by Rumi at Slow Muse - July 2007 which I have (and love) from another source:


The Guesthouse
This human being is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.


A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.


Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.


The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.


Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
Rumi