What do you think?
Rate this book
<legend> </legend>
An extraordinary collaboration between poet and artist, this book is a collection of poems constructed by Justin Petropoulos via manipulation and redaction of Edna Kenton's The Book of Earths, published in 1928, a comprehensive history of theories about the shape of the Earth and its collective folklore. This iteration - one of multiple manifestations - includes poetry of various lengths and forms, organized as titled chapters. Ink drawings on paper produced by Carla Gannis in response to audio recordings of each poem are further informed by many of the original illustrations in The Book of Earths, most of which are variations of Earth maps. Illustrated plates from The Book of Earths Redacted text page, Word processed page, drawing done in response to recordings of recorded readings of the poems.
A brilliant take on the classical premise that logos and poetry are inseparably entwined, legend utilizes the algorithm in a literal redaction of Edna Kenton's The Book of Earths, recalling as well the cut-ups of Bryin Gysin and William S. Burroughs. Shape-shifting Kenton's cosmological visions to reflect a digital age in which new technologies profoundly alter how we measure and represent space, it is a tour de force of cartographic allegory that turns the poetic impulse to "know oneself" into an endless hall of mirrors, the social-aesthetic-virtual self becoming one with the random fertile woods of the unconscious mind.
—Jane Harris, cultural critic and art historian, author of Universe-Rizzoli's Curve: The Female Nude Now
Mallarmé was right: the world is contained in a Book ---- and this is it. With material conviction, Gannis and Petropoulos create an allegorhythmic composition that leaks a digital desire made of 90% erotic gas and 10% total mindfuck. This is the way future robots of the Erotic Age will speak after they see Duchamp's Large Glass.
—Mark Amerika, author of remixthebook
Away from the lights, someone gifts you a text — don’t assume mazes. Redact for love, chew up your constraints. Out of hive, out of mind, de-myth. Hypothetical earths are not books. White out, specific strategy, words spookier up close. Traceries as translation take off fiction clothes. Form is not your fault. Refer = before, data deport plot. The familiar (story, spectacle) as negative feedback. Let’s get less legible. Act to forget how we make it invisible. Periscopes wayward, surveillance as intertextuality, habit common flesh answers. Remotions could be gumbo process inside out. Depedestalize speech acts. Body takes requests. Topographical maps of between, the new ref pt. Proprioexception — “darling is data” — the incommensurable. The impossible takes hostages — to retranslate, refold. OCCUPY “all that disorder” — little algorithmic plastic polis. Affirmation outbreak.
—Bruce Andrews, author of You Can't Have Everything... Where Would You Put It!
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Carla Gannis has exhibited in solo and group art exhibitions nationally and internationally. Her solo exhibitions include "The Multiversal Hippozoonomadon & Prismenagerie" at Pablo's Birthday Gallery, New York, NY; "The Non-Facial Recognition Project" at Edelman Gallery, New York, NY; and "Jezebel" at The Boulder Museum of Art, Boulder, CO. Gannis is the recipient of several awards, including a 2005 New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) Grant in Computer Arts, an Emerge 7 Fellowship from the Aljira Art Center, and a Chashama AREA Visual Arts Studio Award. Features on Gannis's work have appeared in Art Critical, NY Arts Magazine, Animal Magazine, and Collezioni Edge, and her work has been reviewed in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Daily News, and The Village Voice. Gannis holds an MFA in Painting from Boston University and is Assistant Chair of Digital Arts at Pratt Institute. She lives in Brooklyn, New York with poet Justin Petropoulos.
Justin Petropoulos is the author of the poetry collection, Eminent Domain, selected by Anne Waldman for the 2010 Marsh Hawk Press Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared in American Letters & Commentary, Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Columbia Poetry Review, Crab Creek Review, Gulf Coast, Mandorla, Portland Review, and most recently in Spinning Jenny. Petropoulos holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Indiana University. He co-curated "Triptych Readings" from 2010 to 2011 and was a guest blogger for Bryant Park's summer poetry reading series, "Word for Word". Currently Petropoulos is the site director of an after-school program for elementary age children and an adjunct faculty member at New Jersey City University. He lives in Brooklyn, New York with interdisciplinary artist Carla Gannis.
A brilliant take on the classical premise that logos and poetry are inseparably entwined, legend utilizes the algorithm in a literal redaction of Edna Kenton's The Book of Earths, recalling as well the cut-ups of Bryin Gysin and William S. Burroughs. Shape-shifting Kenton's cosmological visions to reflect a digital age in which new technologies profoundly alter how we measure and represent space, it is a tour de force of cartographic allegory that turns the poetic impulse to "know oneself" into an endless hall of mirrors, the social-aesthetic-virtual self becoming one with the random fertile woods of the unconscious mind.
—Jane Harris, cultural critic and art historian, author of Universe-Rizzoli's Curve: The Female Nude Now
Mallarmé was right: the world is contained in a Book ---- and this is it. With material conviction, Gannis and Petropoulos create an allegorhythmic composition that leaks a digital desire made of 90% erotic gas and 10% total mindfuck. This is the way future robots of the Erotic Age will speak after they see Duchamp's Large Glass.
—Mark Amerika, author of remixthebook
Away from the lights, someone gifts you a text — don’t assume mazes. Redact for love, chew up your constraints. Out of hive, out of mind, de-myth. Hypothetical earths are not books. White out, specific strategy, words spookier up close. Traceries as translation take off fiction clothes. Form is not your fault. Refer = before, data deport plot. The familiar (story, spectacle) as negative feedback. Let’s get less legible. Act to forget how we make it invisible. Periscopes wayward, surveillance as intertextuality, habit common flesh answers. Remotions could be gumbo process inside out. Depedestalize speech acts. Body takes requests. Topographical maps of between, the new ref pt. Proprioexception — “darling is data” — the incommensurable. The impossible takes hostages — to retranslate, refold. OCCUPY “all that disorder” — little algorithmic plastic polis. Affirmation outbreak.
—Bruce Andrews, author of You Can't Have Everything... Where Would You Put It!
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Carla Gannis has exhibited in solo and group art exhibitions nationally and internationally. Her solo exhibitions include "The Multiversal Hippozoonomadon & Prismenagerie" at Pablo's Birthday Gallery, New York, NY; "The Non-Facial Recognition Project" at Edelman Gallery, New York, NY; and "Jezebel" at The Boulder Museum of Art, Boulder, CO. Gannis is the recipient of several awards, including a 2005 New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) Grant in Computer Arts, an Emerge 7 Fellowship from the Aljira Art Center, and a Chashama AREA Visual Arts Studio Award. Features on Gannis's work have appeared in Art Critical, NY Arts Magazine, Animal Magazine, and Collezioni Edge, and her work has been reviewed in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Daily News, and The Village Voice. Gannis holds an MFA in Painting from Boston University and is Assistant Chair of Digital Arts at Pratt Institute. She lives in Brooklyn, New York with poet Justin Petropoulos.
Justin Petropoulos is the author of the poetry collection, Eminent Domain, selected by Anne Waldman for the 2010 Marsh Hawk Press Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared in American Letters & Commentary, Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Columbia Poetry Review, Crab Creek Review, Gulf Coast, Mandorla, Portland Review, and most recently in Spinning Jenny. Petropoulos holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Indiana University. He co-curated "Triptych Readings" from 2010 to 2011 and was a guest blogger for Bryant Park's summer poetry reading series, "Word for Word". Currently Petropoulos is the site director of an after-school program for elementary age children and an adjunct faculty member at New Jersey City University. He lives in Brooklyn, New York with interdisciplinary artist Carla Gannis.
- GenresArt
138 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2013
196 people want to read
About the author
Justin Petropoulos
4 books14 followersJustin Petropoulos is the author of two collections of poetry, Eminent Domain (Marsh Hawk Press 2011), selected by Anne Waldman for the 2010 Marsh Hawk Press Poetry Prize and legend /legend (Jaded Ibis Press 2013), a collaborative work with interdisciplinary artist, Carla Gannis. His poems have appeared in American Letters & Commentary, Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Columbia Poetry Review, Crab Creek Review, Gulf Coast, Mandorla, Portland Review, and most recently in Spinning Jenny. He has an MFA in creative writing from Indiana University. Justin was co-curator of Triptych Readings from 2010 to 2011 and a guest blogger for Bryant Park’s summer poetry reading series, Word for Word. He is currently the site director of an after-school program for elementary age children and is an adjunct faculty member at New Jersey City University, where he teaches composition and creative writing.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 4, 2017
Justin Petropoulos and Carla Gannis have created a dissolute masterpiece, remixing anatomy with ethics, and transforming grammar into a delirious transaction between the things of this world. In these poems, the involuntary is electric, and refraction (not to mention reflection) is political. This book constructs a grand architecture of longing, and I loved the disquieting way the foreground opens up into hives and warrens while the language spits out hinges and nodes like conceptual rhymes. Read it!
November 10, 2013
I LOVED this book :) the art work was amazing and the poems are great also! I am so glad I got this book!
January 28, 2016
A melding of the minds of a wonderful artist and a wonderful poet. Worth your time.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews