Syncopated Rhythm

Syncopated Rhythm

This summer (July 22 actually) I wrote a post about a Call for Entry that interests me, quoted below:

"For the group exhibition Poésie muette / Poetry Unspoken, artists are invited to create a work inspired by a piece of literature. Text in all its iterations - a passage from a novel, a poem, a quotation, an extract from a journal article, or simply a word - is to be translated into images that are both creative and expressive. The participants are asked to explore the visual possibilities suggested by the text in the most creative way possible. This is not about imitating literature by being limited to simple narration but, instead, to interpret the text in the proper language of the visual arts. The words should be transposed and appropriated by the artist in order to express what the text suggests to him/her - its rhythm, its tone, and even its physicality (for example: the texture and quality of the paper, the colour of the ink, the shape of the letters or paragraphs)."

How do I "package" this new Cityscape so that it not only meets the requirements of the Call for Entry, but has a little unexpected friction between the image and the quote that accompanies it?  I haven't quite nailed it, but I have a few weeks before the deadline to think this through.

Here is the quote I propose as my inspiration, from Italo Calvino's "Invisible Cities":

"[The city's] secret lies in the way your gaze runs over patterns following one another as in a musical score where not one can be altered or displaced".

The placement of the windows on the buildings' facades reminds me of notes on a musical score, and the small window panes suggest a rhythm to me. The antennae are like the sharps and flats, and the sets of parallel lines are the chords of the music. Or, from the same book,

"The city, however, does not tell its past, but contains it like the lines of a hand, written in the corners of the streets, the gratings of the windows, the banisters of the steps."

Thoughts?

Of course, as with all calls for entry, there is no guarantee the work will be accepted. So much depends on reading the minds of those who set the parameters, the appeal of the other entries, and the concerns of hanging a cohesive yet varied show.

YES!!! Delighted to report that the piece has been accepted into the exhibition. For more information, please refer to my post of January 20, 2016.