Fleurs du Mal Magazine
Watou Arts Festival 2024
makes room for imagination
The city of Poperinge, inspirator Koen Vanmechelen and curators James Putnam and Michaël Vandebril present the 2024 edition of Watou Arts Festival. ‘Landscape of the Imagination’ will take place from July 6 to September 1. Artists and poets will showcase the power of the imagination, in dialogue with each other and with several unique locations in and around the village and castle De Lovie.
Imagination as an engine of change
The new edition of the Watou Arts Festival focuses on the power of the imagination. After two successful editions, Koen Vanmechelen and Michaël Vandebril assume their role, for the third consecutive time, as respectively inspirer and curator of poetry. James Putnam, who has previously (in 2022) assumed the role of visual arts curator, completes the three-member curatorial team.
Many of the artists developed their works in dialogue with Watou’s locality. In the spring of 2023, a record number of 200 artists registered for the open call ‘Patchwwwork’. An international jury – chaired by Koen Vanmechelen and consisting of Dirk Draulans, Jo Coucke, Marjan Doom, James Putnam, Edith Doove, Michaël Vandebril, Sabiha Keyif and Loes Vandromme – selected the participants for the summer camp. Their ideas ‘flow’ from the landscape, which resulted in some twenty new realizations. As a result, theartworks are sometimes playful, but at the same time thought-provoking.
A selection of participating artists*:
Pato Bosich (CL) – Cecile Broekaert (BE) – Monique Broekman (NL) – Linde Carrijn & Dijf Sanders (BE) – Mat Collishaw (GB) – Matthijs De Block (BE) – Lieze De Middeleir (BE) – Werner de Valk (NL) – Joost Elschot (NL) – Karolina Halatek (PL) – Mariko Hori (JP) – John Isaacs (GB) – Lafleur & Bogaert (HT & BE) – Ilya Kabakov (RU) – Carel Lanters & Lee Eun Young (NL & KR) – Mashid Mohadjerin & Jan De Vroede (IR & BE) – Daan Navarrete-van der Pluijm (NL) – Alice Obee (BE) – Mikes Poppe (BE) – Roundhouse Platform (US) – Marina Resende Santos (BR) – Anila Rubiku (AL) – Sanne van Balen (NL) – Lieke van der Meer (NL) – Lie van der Werff (NL) – Laura Vandewynckel (BE) – Koen Vanmechelen (BE) *more to be announced
A selection of participating poets*:
Benno Barnard (NL) – Moya De Feyter (BE) – Dominique De Groen (BE) – Paul Demets (BE) – Al Galidi (NL) – Ingmar Heytze (NL) – Doina Ioanid (RO) – Frank Keizer (NL) – collectief Letterzetter (Imane Karroumi – Loeke Vanhoutteghem – Veronica Schmalz – Alice Boudry – Maite Vanthournout) (BE) –Jens Meijen (BE) – Carl Norac (BE) – Maria van Daalen (NL) – Marjolijn van Heemstra (NL) – Anke Verschueren (BE) – Billie Vos (BE) – Daniëlle Zawadi (NL) – Emma Zuiderveen (NL) *more to be announced
KUNSTENFESTIVAL / ARTSFESTIVAL / WATOU 2024
06/07 TM 01/09/2024
More on website:
https://www.kunstenfestivalwatou.be/
& https://www.poperinge.be/
fleursdumal.nl Magazine for Art & Literature
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In her new collection Who Will Make The Fire, published in association with New River Press, Bellamacina employs metaphors of wind, dawn, trees and fire to explore an interior world.
A personal book about love, loss, nature, depression and recovery, the wind in Who Will Make The Fire becomes the biographer of the self; a way to trace this everevolving garden, that must die, again and again, like a wild bird shedding its unimaginable feathers.
Who Will Make The Fire questions what it is to really live, to live with stillness and fire; to combat the digital world and to get back to the earth and let the hidden circle of nature find its way back into the self.
‘Dreamlike, with bite. Bellamacina’s work is brutal, floral, blood-soaked and knowing, in the way that nature is both cruel and beautiful.’ ― Florence Welch
Greta Bellamacina published her first collection ‘Kaleidoscope’ in 2011. In 2014 she was short-listed as the Young Poet Laureate of London. In 2015 she edited ‘A Collection of Contemporary British Love Poetry’ a survey of British love poetry from Ted Hughes til now, it features the work of Wendy Cope, Emily Berry, Annie Freud and Sam Riviere. She has been a writer-in-residence at the Chateau Marmont Hotel in LA. and Andy Warhol’s Interview Magazine says Greta, ” is garnering critical acclaim for her way with words and her ability to translate the classic poetic form into the contemporary creative landscape.” Greta’s new collection “Perishing Tame” is a dazzling and frank meditation on motherhood, female identity, ennui and love. Greta and her work have featured in The Guardian, The Times, The Evening Standard, Dazed & Confused, I-D Magazine, Interview Magazine, British Vogue, Elle , Wonderland, and Hunger Magazine. She has performed her poetry on CNN, BBC World News, BBC Radio 4 , BBC London, BBC Radio 2 with Jonathan Ross and BBC Radio 3 on The Verb poetry show.
Greta Bellamacina:
Who Will Make the Fire
Publisher: Cheerio Publishing
Publication Date: 20 Jun. 2024
Language: English
Hardcover
ISBN-10: 1739440595
ISBN-13 978-1739440596
£12.99
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The Storm
I thought of you when I was wakened
By a wind that made me glad and afraid
Of the rushing, pouring sound of the sea
That the great trees made.
One thought in my mind went over and over
While the darkness shook and the leaves were thinned—
I thought it was you who had come to find me,
You were the wind.
Sara Teasdale
(1884-1933)
The Storm
from: Flame and Shadow
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Air and Angels
Twice or thrice had I lov’d thee,
Before I knew thy face or name;
So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame
Angels affect us oft, and worshipp’d be;
Still when, to where thou wert, I came,
Some lovely glorious nothing I did see.
But since my soul, whose child love is,
Takes limbs of flesh, and else could nothing do,
More subtle than the parent is
Love must not be, but take a body too;
And therefore what thou wert, and who,
I bid Love ask, and now
That it assume thy body, I allow,
And fix itself in thy lip, eye, and brow.
Whilst thus to ballast love I thought,
And so more steadily to have gone,
With wares which would sink admiration,
I saw I had love’s pinnace overfraught;
Ev’ry thy hair for love to work upon
Is much too much, some fitter must be sought;
For, nor in nothing, nor in things
Extreme, and scatt’ring bright, can love inhere;
Then, as an angel, face, and wings
Of air, not pure as it, yet pure, doth wear,
So thy love may be my love’s sphere;
Just such disparity
As is ‘twixt air and angels’ purity,
‘Twixt women’s love, and men’s, will ever be.
John Donne
(1572–1631)
Air and Angels
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Farewell
Fare thee well, we’ve no wish to detain thee,
For the loved ones are bidding thee come,
And, we know, a bright welcome awaits thee
In the smiles and the sunshine of home,
Thou art safe on the crest of the billow,
And safe in the depths of the sea;
For the God we have worshipped together
Is Almighty, and careth for thee.
And when, in the home of thy fathers,
Thy fervent petition shall rise
For the loved who are circling around thee,
The joy and delight of thine eyes,
Oh, then, for the weak and the faltering,
Should a prayer, as sweet incense, ascend
To the God we have worshipped together,
Remember thy far-distant friend.
We miss the calm light of thy spirit,
We miss thy encouraging smile;
But we bless the unslumbering Shepherd
Who sent thee to cheer us awhile.
The light, which burned brightly among us,
We rejoiced for a season to see,
For the God we have worshipped together
Gave a halo of glory to thee.
But didst thou not point to another,
A brighter, an unsetting sun?
For thou preached not thyself to us, brother,
But Jesus, the Crucified One.
May He be thy rock and thy refuge,
In Him thy “strong confidence” be;
For the God we have worshipped together
Still loveth and careth for thee.
Oh! mayst thou abide ‘neath the shadow
Of Immanuel’s sheltering wing,
And continue proclaiming the goodness
Of Zion’s all-glorious King,
Till the sun shall be turned into darkness,
The moon in obscurity be;
And the God we have worshipped together,
Be a “light everlasting” to thee.
Eliza Paul Kirkbride Gurney
(1801 – 1888)
Farewell
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More in: # Classic Poetry Archive, Archive G-H, Archive G-H
Because I could not stop for Death
Because I could not stop for Death –
He kindly stopped for me –
The Carriage held but just Ourselves –
And Immortality.
We slowly drove – He knew no haste
And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For His Civility –
We passed the School, where Children strove
At Recess – in the Ring –
We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –
We passed the Setting Sun –
Or rather – He passed Us –
The Dews drew quivering and Chill –
For only Gossamer, my Gown –
My Tippet – only Tulle –
We paused before a House that seemed
A Swelling of the Ground –
The Roof was scarcely visible –
The Cornice – in the Ground –
Since then – ’tis Centuries – and yet
Feels shorter than the Day
I first surmised the Horses’ Heads
Were toward Eternity –
Emily Dickinson
(1830-1886)
Because I could not stop for Death
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XVIII
In Heaven,
Some little blades of grass
Stood before God.
“What did you do?”
Then all save one of the little blades
Began eagerly to relate
The merits of their lives.
This one stayed a small way behind
Ashamed.
Presently God said:
“And what did you do?”
The little blade answered: “Oh, my lord,
“Memory is bitter to me
“For if I did good deeds
“I know not of them.”
Then God in all His splendor
Arose from His throne.
“Oh, best little blade of grass,” He said.
Stephen Crane
(1871 – 1900)
In Heaven XVIII
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Autumn
I dwell alone – I dwell alone, alone,
Whilst full my river flows down to the sea,
Gilded with flashing boats
That bring no friend to me:
O love-songs, gurgling from a hundred throats,
O love-pangs, let me be.
Fair fall the freighted boats which gold and stone
And spices bear to sea:
Slim, gleaming maidens swell their mellow notes,
Love-promising, entreating –
Ah! sweet, but fleeting –
Beneath the shivering, snow-white sails.
Hush! the wind flags and fails –
Hush! they will lie becalmed in sight of strand –
Sight of my strand, where I do dwell alone;
Their songs wake singing echoes in my land –
They cannot hear me moan.
One latest, solitary swallow flies
Across the sea, rough autumn-tempest tossed,
Poor bird, shall it be lost?
Dropped down into this uncongenial sea,
With no kind eyes
To watch it while it dies,
Unguessed, uncared for, free:
Set free at last,
The short pang past,
In sleep, in death, in dreamless sleep locked fast.
Mine avenue is all a growth of oaks,
Some rent by thunder strokes,
Some rustling leaves and acorns in the breeze;
Fair fall my fertile trees,
That rear their goodly heads, and live at ease.
A spider’s web blocks all mine avenue;
He catches down and foolish painted flies
That spider wary and wise.
Each morn it hangs a rainbow strung with dew
Betwixt boughs green with sap,
So fair, few creatures guess it is a trap:
I will not mar the web,
Though sad I am to see the small lives ebb.
It shakes – my trees shake – for a wind is roused
In cavern where it housed:
Each white and quivering sail,
Of boats among the water leaves
Hollows and strains in the full-throated gale:
Each maiden sings again –
Each languid maiden, whom the calm
Had lulled to sleep with rest and spice and balm
Miles down my river to the sea
They float and wane,
Long miles away from me.
Perhaps they say: ‘She grieves,
Uplifted, like a beacon, on her tower.’
Perhaps they say: ‘One hour
More, and we dance among the golden sheaves.’
Perhaps they say: ‘One hour
More, and we stand,
Face to face, hand in hand;
Make haste, O slack gale, to the looked-for land!’
My trees are not in flower,
I have no bower,
And gusty creaks my tower,
And lonesome, very lonesome, is my strand.
Christina Georgina Rossetti
(1830 – 1894)
Autumn
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21% BTW
EEN WAARDELOOS IDEE
NEW DUTCH GOVERNMENT
intends to raise tax on books
from 9 to 21%.
Readers and writers
will not accept this.
STICHTING CPNB: De voorgenomen hogere btw op (kinder)boeken zal leiden tot een forse prijsverhoging. Een slechte zaak, want het Nederlandse boek is dé basis van lees- en taalvaardigheid. We roepen daarom iedereen op de petitie te tekenen tegen het voornemen om de btw op boeken met 12% te verhogen.
Teken en verspreid de petitie en ga naar www.boekenpetitie.nl
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The Deceased
He was a reprobate I grant,
and always liquired till his money went.
His hair depended on a noose from
his pale brow, his eyes were dumb.
Like prisoners in their cavernous slots were
settled in attitudes of despair.
You who God bless you never sunk so low
censure and pray for him that he was so.
And with his failings you regret the verses
the fellow made, proberly between curses,
proberly in the extreames of moral decay
but he wrote them in a sincere way.
And seems to have felt a sort of pain
to which your imagination can not attain!
Keith Douglas
(1920 – 1944)
The Deceased
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At Midnight
Now at last I have come to see what life is,
Nothing is ever ended, everything only begun,
And the brave victories that seem so splendid
Are never really won.
Even love that I built my spirit’s house for,
Comes like a brooding and a baffled guest,
And music and men’s praise and even laughter
Are not so good as rest.
Sara Teasdale
(1884-1933)
At Midnight
from: Flame and Shadow
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The Higher Pantheism
The sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills and the plains,-
Are not these, O Soul, the Vision of Him who reigns?
Is not the Vision He, tho’ He be not that which He seems?
Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams?
Earth, these solid stars, this weight of body and limb,
Are they not sign and symbol of thy division from Him?
Dark is the world to thee; thyself art the reason why,
For is He not all but thou, that hast power to feel “I am I”?
Glory about thee, without thee; and thou fulfillest thy doom,
Making Him broken gleams and a stifled splendour and gloom.
Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and Spirit with Spirit can meet-
Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands and feet.
God is law, say the wise; O soul, and let us rejoice,
For if He thunder by law the thunder is yet His voice.
Law is God, say some; no God at all, says the fool,
For all we have power to see is a straight staff bent in a pool;
And the ear of man cannot hear, and the eye of man cannot see;
But if we could see and hear, this Vision-were it not He?
Alfred Lord Tennyson
(1809-1892)
The Higher Pantheism
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