EKPHRASIS: Poems that Converse with Art with Brenda Cárdenas (Washington Island Literary Festival)

Elizabeth Bergmann Loizeaux in her book Twentieth-Century Poetry and the Visual Arts speaks of the communitarian sense of collaboration that ekphrasis can be when a poet puts “the ekphrastic power of the word…to the service of connection that here and there, now and then, self and other not be isolated.” With such in mind, this workshop will be held at the Art and Nature Center where we will first discuss various approaches one may take to writing an ekphrastic poem and then choose a work of visual art in the center that inspires, intrigues, puzzles, or moves us. Rather than simply describing the art, we will attempt to write poems that converse with, correspond with, or “riff off” of the art, using various prompts the instructor has prepared to help us do so. We will work toward creating a third space where the dyad (poem and art together) is something more or different than its parts–something, perhaps, unexpected!