The 5th Annual New York City Poetry Festival
July 25-26, 2015
11:00 am – 6:00 pm
Governors Island’s Colonel’s Row
FREE & OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
The New York City Poetry Festival on Governors Island Announces its 2015 Program
The New York City Poetry Festival, now heading into its 5th year, showcases all of the different formats, aesthetics, and personalities of New York City reading series, small presses, and collectives, in one place at one time. This free festival intends to create branches between disparate poetry communities, and other artists and artisans, by bringing poetry out of the dark bars and universities and by placing it in the sun. The 5th Annual New York City Poetry Festival will include over 75 poetry organizations and 250 poets on its three main stages; a Vendor’s Village where local booksellers, artists and craft makers will sell their wares; healthy and delicious food truck options (including Morris Grilled Cheese & Big D’s Grub Truck); a beer/wine garden sponsored by Brooklyn Brewery and The Abbey, poetry-inspired installation art throughout; the Ring of Daisies open mic; and the 4th Annual Children’s Poetry Festival, this year sponsored by Writopia Lab, complete with writing games and its own fourth, all-kids stage.
This year’s headliners include acclaimed poet and memoirist Nick Flynn, award-winning poet, playwright and cultural activist Patricia Spears Jones, esteemed poetry scholar David Matlin, and Fran Quinn, whom Robert Bly called “one of the greatest poetry teachers in the country.” Other highlights of this year’s festival include readings curated by Brooklyn Poets, Coldfront Magazine, Great Weather for MEDIA, The Poetry Project, and VIDA: Women in the Literary Arts.
The Poetry Society of New York will also be featuring The Typewriter Project booth, fresh from its recent installation in Tompkins Square Park, as well as The Poetry Brothel, which will be taking over house 407 along Colonel’s Row to create an intimate and immersive, candlelit experience.
For a complete lineup, event schedule, list of vendors, sponsors, and other programing; or to submit your application to become a vendor, sponsor, or volunteer, please visit the New York City Poetry Festival’s website: http://newyorkcitypoetryfestival.com.
Register for the New York City Poetry Festival and enter to win a New York City Poetry Festival tote bag filled with signed copies of books by Nick Flynn, Patricia Spears Jones, David Matlin, and Fran Quinn: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-5th-annual-new-york-city-poetry-festival-tickets-16306091960
To stay up to date about all things #nycpofest, follow the festival on Facebook and Twitter.
For all other inquiries, contact Stephanie Berger at [email protected].
The New York City Poetry Festival was funded in part by Poets & Writers, Inc., with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.
PSNY Announces The 2015 New York City Poetry Festival Art Installations
New York, NY — July 6th, 2015 — The New York City Poetry Festival, now in its 5th year, showcases all of the different formats, aesthetics, and personalities of New York City reading series, small presses, and collectives, in one place at one time. To be held on July 25th and 26th on Governors Island, this year’s festival will include over 75 poetry organizations and 250 poets on its three main stages. It also features a Vendor’s Village where local booksellers, artists and craft makers will sell their wares and healthy and delicious food trucks will set up shop. The festival will include a luxurious beer & wine garden sponsored by Brooklyn Brewery and The Abbey. And of course, it will house the 4th Annual Children’s Poetry Festival, this year sponsored by Writopia Lab, a magical land of balloon forests, writing exercises, and its own fourth kids-only stage!
In addition, each year The New York City Poetry Festival features a slew of poetry-inspired art installations, which are sometimes the festival’s most popular stops. We are very pleased to announce the details of these installations.
The Poetry Society of New York will be presenting The Typewriter Project booth, fresh from its recent installation in Tompkins Square Park on Colonel’s Row, and also displaying the scrolls produced at Tompkins Square Park in building 407. Also inhabiting building 407 will be The Poetry Brothel, an intimate and immersive experience in which poets offer private poetry readings in candlelit back rooms. On the main festival grounds, The Poetry Society of New York will also weave a giant Ring of Daisies, inside of which an Open Mic will take place from 1:30-5:30pm each day of the festival (sign up at the info table from 11am-1:30pm each day).
In addition, The New York City Poetry Festival will present the following installations:
In his latest artwork, “DIONYSIA: A Bacchic Ode,” Karl C. Leone reignites the Cult of Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, ecstasy and theatre. In Leone’s dangerous and unexpected interpretation of the myth, the performance becomes ritual and its audience initiates into a realm of drunken jubilation. The piece will run from Noon- 3pm on Saturday and Sunday, featuring installation art by Alexis Myre and performances by Aron Cantor, Nettie Chickering, Natalie Cloarec, Mateo d’Amato, Robin Delany, Hailey Kemp, Olivia Porter, Michelle Rosen, Ramona Tim Kee, and Lewis Welt.
“to touch” by Rachel Ossip is an interactive poetry installation that creates a layered grid of “stanzas,” which every reader/writer/viewer is invited to write, edit, and re-write. It’s an extra-large, transparent, crowed-sourced poem that one can wander through.
In “Word Graveyard” by Christine Stoddard, festival goers will have the opportunity to craft their own epitaphs on tombstone photo-collages.
“The Rose Tree” by Dallas Athent is an interactive installation, named after William Butler Yeats’ famous poem, in which passersby are encouraged to take one of one hundred poems classic poems displayed and leave another one of their own favorite behind in its place.
As part of the Tandem Poetry Project, poets Maya Stein and Amy Tingle will set up vintage typewriters and wait for strangers to wander by and give them a word. Using equal parts intuition and connection, Maya and Amy will each write a spontaneous poem on an index card inspired by the word they are given, and then give their poems away.
For a complete lineup, event schedule, list of vendors, sponsors, and other programing; or to submit your application to become a vendor, sponsor, or volunteer, please visit the New York City Poetry Festival’s website: http://newyorkcitypoetryfestival.com.
Register for the New York City Poetry Festival and enter to win a New York City Poetry Festival tote bag filled with signed copies of books by Nick Flynn, Patricia Spears Jones, David Matlin, and Fran Quinn: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-5th-annual-new-york-city-poetry-festival-tickets-16306091960
To stay up to date about all things #nycpofest, follow the festival on Facebook and Twitter.
For all other inquiries, contact Stephanie Berger at [email protected].
The New York City Poetry Festival was funded in part by Poets & Writers, Inc., with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.
Sponsors include: The Abbey, Brooklyn Brewery, Brooklyn Poets, C. Bravo Productions LLC, C.S. Literary Jewelry, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Graze, The Great American Poetry Show, Great Weather for Media, Literary Manhattan, Nespresso, Runa, Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Creative Writing, and Writopia Lab.
