Making Poetry Tangible Through Art

How did you get involved with Book Arts?

When I moved to Buffalo, I heard about Book Arts through my program and worked with some other students on broadsides using the press on SUNY’s north campus. Then I was also gifted a membership by someone and took a couple of the classes they offer.

When did you begin writing poetry and when did you start incorporating in into your art?

I have been writing poetry for a long time. I think the order is actually the reverse of what the question asks. In the last two or three years I’ve started incorporating other kinds of art elements into my poetry practice. 

What do you want audiences to gain from your exhibition?

I just hope people enjoy it and maybe they will speculate about different ways of reading. A lot of the work is mobile, so I’m interested to see if people will want to move it around or move themselves around it.

What was your biggest takeaway from your studio residency?

The biggest takeaway is the resources, the equipment and materials, and how they can help inform what sort of art gets made, what are the limits and what are the possibilities. For example, I was really interested in using the iterability of the presses (print 1, print 2, print 3) as part of what my projects are curious about. I really pushed myself to use color, too, since I had all these color papers and inks available.

“In the last two or three years I’ve started incorporating other kinds of art elements into my poetry practice.”

This blog post was written by Book Arts Gallery Assistant, Nina Grenga. Nina is currently getting her Master’s at the University at Buffalo in Critical Museum Studies with a concentration in Arts Management.