Geoffrey Young Poet

Discussion "The Interplay Between Words and Image in Collaborative Works" September 5, 2007 (Wednesday) 7:00 p.m. Reading & Discussion University Art Museum Fine Arts Building UAlbany Uptown Campus

Pockets of Wheat James Siena Visual Artist

Geoffrey Young, poet, and James Siena, visual artist, will discuss the interplay between word and image in their collaborative publication "Pockets of Wheat" (1996, reissued 2007), featuring poems by Young and black-and-white abstractions by Siena. The University Art Museum's current exhibition, "James Siena: BIG FAST INK: Drawings, 1996-2007" (curated by Geoffrey Young), includes Siena's drawings from "Pockets of Wheat." The exhibit runs July 12 through September 30, 2007.

Geoffrey Young's most recent poetry collection is "Lights Out" (2004), which also features illustrations by James Siena.

"Young has long been a fringe figure amid the Language Poets and the neo-New York School poets... and this impressive compendium of recent work might put him right at the center." - "Publishers Weekly"

"The rapport between Siena and Young is akin to musicians communicating through their instruments. They bring to the reader not something better than they could solo, but something different: Together Young and Siena have created a tapestry that dovetails and diverges but never loses the common thread...." - "The Brooklyn Rail" (independent cultural magazine)

Young is also publisher of The Figures Press--one of the oldest small presses in the country-and owner of the Geoffrey Young Gallery, both in Great Barrington, MA. His other books of poetry include "Fickle Sonnets" (2005), "Cerulean Embankments" (1999), "Admiral Fever" (1997), and "Rocks and Deals" (1987).

James Siena is considered one of the leading abstract expressionists presently at work. Inspired by a range of disparate sources-patterns, algorithms, puzzle-like geometries-his paintings and drawings are constructed almost entirely by hand-drawn line. His work has been featured in numerous exhibitions, including the 2004 Whitney Biennial. He is the recipient of awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation, and The New York Foundation for the Arts.

BIG FAST INK will feature 10 never-before shown drawings from "Pockets of Wheat" alongside more recent work by James Siena. The large-scale drawings were made eleven years ago to accompany Geoffrey Young's poems for the book. They were bought soon after the book's publication in 1996, by collector A. G. Rosen, and have not been shown previously.

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