Saturday, April 7, 2012

The Present Order

I think he might want us to really think.  (Zoe)

Finlay is something of a Zen master, hiding his wisdom in the illusion of smallness.  (Emma)

These images were complex but not complicated.  (Joe)

Finlay uses text as a composing factor in his work, like architecture.  (Andrew)

Highly cerebral in nature, Finlay relies on consciously leading the viewer or reader through specific moments in time.  In particular I loved the concept behind Ocean Stripe Series 5, subjecting the reader to the monotonous task of reading the same thing over and over again.  (Kyle)

Finlay is a material poet, somebody who is concerned with the textures, flexibility, structural integrity of his piece.  If I were to stretch this thought, in a sense, he is a designer.

On Alec Finlay's essay, "W-I-L-D-H-A-W-T-H-O-R-N-P-R-E-S-S":  I found the visual play with alternating upper and lower case letters very menacing to read!  It was as if I were jumping visual hurdles in an attempt to formulate the word and further, the piece.  (Wesley)

Who the heck is Ian Hamilton Finlay? (Lauren M)

What I found charming but also equally unsettling about The Present Order was its fierce assertion of itself over the reader.  It constructs a reality we are somehow forced to accept.  The reality of this world is convincing because of its self-awareness and sensitivity to space, page, text, and time.  It does not, however, pull us from our own reality, but invites the reader to explore new tributaries of possibility.
(Emily)

Finlay uses a multipronged multi-faceted approach to conveying meaning.  Operating both within and without but always intrinsically close to the idea of concrete poetry, he takes advantage of words, their meaning, their connotation, their architecture, their relationship, their sound.  By making use of more than one dimension , he is able to overcome the usual limitations of language to sublimate his work into something greater.  Deeper and more ephemeral.  (Joshua)

     At first I found it very hard to really get into this book.  I spent the first few hours in the mist of the first chapter, "Poet or Artist."  I found it very hard to follow, so I decided to go back and read the introduction.
     This was a big refresher on the purpose of introductions.  I got a lot of clarity on the work.  (Esmé)

What I found most compelling about Finlay's work was the way in which he directly dealt with the elements of language, such as syntax and language relationships.  Finlay dealt with syntax by using a toy as his poem while most poets play with syntax in their poems by word choice -- this to me is an indirect appropach to syntax, containing an extra degree of separation.  Finlay's disposal of syntax with his toy directly and elegantly strikes to the core of the issue, and why he is so successful.  (Erik)

No wind would blow these letters as it would the blades of grass.  (Thea)

Reading this book made me that much more excited to create more of my own poetry as it depicted poetry much as a painting for the eye as it is words for the mind.  (Avery)

I've always enjoyed artists who work in the language of non-artistic practice, and Finlay's presentation of these references with only subtle nods to their actual origin makes for a fascinating investigation on the part of the reader.  The terms take on a very physical presence when we cannot connect them to their particular function.  Finlay's work in stone seemed to be another great exercise in this sort of conceptual presence--as the objects themselves gain weight the subjects they portray become less specific, more referential.  Though not mentioned until later on, the "casual" stone piece from Unnatural Pebbles struck me in its relation to two Poems--one evokes thick, mysterious, spiritual weight carried on fragile material while the other portrays a seemingly breezy, offhand marking as a physically heavy, formally significant material.  (Trevor)

What I am most drawn to in concrete poetry is the limitation it enforces on the artist.  (Poetry has one "side" if we imagine it to be just language.  A block of concrete has six sides which when related to concrete poetry becomes an extension of poetry wherein there are more things to consider than the language: size of the surface, materiality of the surface, where the surface is situated, the placement of the letters and words and so on).  Yes, concrete poetry has a greater number of variables that are to be considered when compared to poetry.  But the linguistic variable is fixed.  In a way, concrete poetry asks, "How much can you do with language?  How far can you push it?" (Prashast)

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