Visual Art for Poets

While words convey meaning, they are also visual, musical, and physical. Poetry is not only something we read and write—it is something we perceive, something that has a shape on the page. Yet the embodiment of language is often lost, and the art we make can begin to feel stagnant. Reconnecting words with their form offers a path through which our practice can be enriched and revitalized. 

In my practice as a visual artist, I'm interested in the cross-pollination between different media: drawing with words; pairing video art with music; animating poetry; projecting video on paintings. Ideas emerge from unexpected places and flow into hidden crevices. The best work often materializes when I've surprised myself into new ways of seeing. 

We'll begin by exploring artists who incorporate language in their visual work and poets who use a visual approach to deepen the impact of words. Then we'll get our hands dirty—or not—with simple materials (and our own words). We'll embark on a series of exercises designed to liberate us from habit, open new possibilities for making and thinking, spark future explorations, and invite us into a practice that celebrates accident and surprise as fertile ground for discovery. 

Naomie Kremer's work is in many private and public collections, including the Whitney Museum of American Art, The Berkeley Art Museum, The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, and the US Embassy in Beijing, China. Kremer has created video-based set designs including The Secret Garden, with San Francisco Opera; the Berkeley Opera production of Bluebeard's Castle by Béla Bartók; Tristan and Isolde by Richard Wagner; Alcina, by George F. Handel performed by Les Talent Lyriques in the Crusaders Courtyard in Acre, Israel; Song of the Earth, by Gustav Mahler, performed at the Marseille Opera House; and Light Moves, with Margaret Jenkins Dance Company. Her short films include In His Own Words, with ShadowLight Productions based on Marc Chagall's autobiography; In the Beginning was Desire, with David Grubin Productions, based on interviews with Dr. Avivah Zornberg; and The Alma Enigma, about Alma Mahler, screened in Marseille, France, during Manifesta 13.

Grounded in observation, Kremer's work draws upon architecture, landscape, the human figure, language, and the visual structures of written communication. Her paintings often incorporate fragments of text, letterforms, and gestural marks that hover between writing and image, reflecting a longstanding interest in the relationship between language, memory, identity, and embodied experience. Music, literature, poetry, art history, and cultural traditions have all served as important sources for her work.

*If the ticket fee is a hardship, Yetzirah offers a pay-what-you-can option for workshop participation. No one will be turned away for lack of funds, but please contact Program Coordinator Kyra Lisse at klisse@yetzirahpoets.org if you would like a sliding-scale ticket. 

Yetzirah is a nonprofit organization, and any gift you make is tax-deductible to the extent allowed by the law.