a museum acquisition of an artwork is a BIG deal. as digital artist Connie Bakshi eloquently put it in our recent X Space celebrating US National Poetry Month, “a museum acquisition is a commitment to steward both the materiality and immateriality of art.” but when was the last time you saw a museum acquire poetry?

we’re thrilled to announce that Mad Arts - an immersive art + tech museum in South Florida - has acquired 22 digital poems from theVERSEverse, making it the largest digital poetry acquisition by a museum to date. read the full announcement here.  

in this edition of conVERSEverse, we’re covering:

• “poem = acquired” by lorepunk + Shannon Chen See

• from the gallery: VERSA by theVERSEverse x Ross Goodwin

• poetry in the wild: NFC Lisbon, exciting wins for Christian Bök, ++

written by Shannon // edited by Elisabeth

“poem = acquired”

by lorepunk + Shannon Chen See

image credits: Mad Arts

poetry has always been a form of art, yet when we walk into most museums, poetry is infrequently exhibited and rarely acquired. using the Mad Arts’ acquisition of digital poetry as a lens, this article co-written by lorepunk and Shannon Chen See makes the case for why museums need more poetry as now more than ever, poem = work of art.

from the gallery: VERSA

by theVERSEverse x Ross Goodwin

VERSA is an emergent AI poet developed by theVERSEverse x Ross Goodwin, trained on the collective and ever-expanding poetry of the writers of theVERSEverse. VERSA reflects the evolution of language as a technology.

thanks to our friends at fx(hash) & Tezos, you can collect VERSA poems directly on our site. oh, to sync 🖤

poetry in the wild

✨ Digital Art Week London was a dream. poetry and visuals by Sasha Stiles, Ana María Caballero, Marcos de la Fuente, Caridad Moro-Gronlier, and Ellie Pritts took over massive, immersive screens at Charing Cross. 

image credits: Sasha Stiles

🇵🇹 theVERSEverse will take the stage at the Non-Fungible Conference this month in Lisbon! our co-founder Ana María Caballero will present on theVERSEverse and show the curated works of Tina Chang x Emily Edelman, Marci Calabretta Cancio-Bello x Gretta Louw, Nathaniel Stern x Anne Spalter, and Legna Rodriguez x Veštica.

📝 Virginia Valenzuela (@vinnythesnail) is curating the “words beyond words” exhibition of text-based art for Mint Gold Dust, and she’s seeking poetry submissions. apply to the open call by May 27 to be considered! 

👏 congrats to Christian Bök, whose iconic work of poetry EUNOIA has been adapted for the stage by Denise Fujiwara. if you’re in Vancouver this weekend, don’t miss the Fujiwara Dance performance of EUNOIA at the Firehall Art Centre, running May 8-11. in other exciting news, all 425 numbered “effects” from Christian’s THE KAZIMIR EFFECT sold out! 

that’s a wrap on conVERSEverse edition #3! If you enjoyed reading, please forward the newsletter to a friend, or take a few moments to give your (anonymous) feedback below:

• loved it! 🤍 - tell us what you liked

• it was okay 😔 - tell us how to improve

• it was bad 👎 - tell us why

in the words of Nas:

“no idea's original, there's nothing new under the sun
it's never what you do, but how it's done”

for this conVERSEverse, we’re celebrating the poets + writers whose works influence what we read & write today. starting today and throughout the month of April, we invite you to post a selfie of you with your favorite poem, book, chapbook, picture of a poet/author, hashtag #reVERSEverse + tag us @theVERSEverse. 

this edition, we’re covering:

• “on the value of rereading books” by Nicole Tallman

• “whose paths do you trace?” by Shannon Chen See

• from the gallery: FIFTY DAYS AT ILIAM by Christian Bök x Sarah Ridgley

• poetry in the wild (ft. NYC events if you’re in town)

let’s reVERSEverse.

“on the value of rereading books” by Nicole Tallman

“rereading books for me is like spending time with an old friend—the kind of friend in whose company I pick right up where we left off, even if we haven’t spoken in a while.” in this short essay, Nicole meditates on the value of rereading books, drawing connections between books she rereads - like Perfume by Patrick Süskind and Ariel by Sylvia Plath - and her poetry.

“whose paths do you trace?” by Shannon Chen See + theVERSEverse community

as poets, we know one of the best ways to improve our own writing is to read widely, to be inspired by others. we asked a few poets from our community about their inspirations to understand how they became the poets they are today. thank you Katie Dozier, Lorepunk, Odd Writings, and Elisabeth Sweet for sharing pieces of your poetry journeys with us 🤍

from the gallery: FIFTY DAYS AT ILIAM by Christian Bök x Sarah Ridgley

FIFTY DAYS AT ILIAM is a perfect example of how our poetry dialogues with and builds on the work of poets who came before us. Christian Bök prompted Sudowrite to compose ten lines of poetry, each line derived from the title of a painting in the series, ‘Fifty Days at Iliam’ by Cy Twombly (which was based on Alexander Pope's translation of Homer's Iliad). Sarah Ridgley then used her own algorithm to repeat each of these outputs in the form of handwritten flourishes.

poetry in the wild

• ✨ congratulations to Caridad Moro-Gronlier, who was just named Miami-Dade County’s new poet laureate

• 📙 THIRTY SIX by Pierre Gervois is a poetry book of 44 poems. Each poem is based on data extracted from anonymized interviews with members of the crypto community conducted with the author during the NFT.NYC conference.

• 🎊 The Wonder of it All by Anne Spalter was auctioned on Sotheby’s and acquired by the Centre Pompidou Museum in Paris! This piece is an epic abstract sci-fi voyage through a fantastical realm generated with the assistance of text-to-image-based custom AI tools.

• 💐 flowers to Lillian-Yvonne Bertram for being named a Foundation for Contemporary Arts grant recipient 

• 🌆 NFT.NYC events: 

that’s a wrap on conVERSEverse edition #2! If you enjoyed reading, please forward the newsletter to a friend, or take a few moments to give your (anonymous) feedback below:

• loved it! 🤍 - tell us what you liked

• it was okay 😔 - tell us how to improve

• it was bad 👎 - tell us why

hello, hi, welcome to conVERSEverse 🌱

theVERSEverse poetry community did a lot last year.

this year, we are refocusing by revisiting what we’ve accomplished – celebrating our efforts and the path that brought us here, the path we carved, the path along which we met all of you.

conVERSEverse is part of that ritual of rereading, and we are happy to have you as part of the journey. let’s dive in 👇

a glimpse of le travail des rêves by aurèce vettier

le travail des rêves by aurèce vettier blends dreams and memories to express the deepest vulnerabilities of the human experience. symbols of grief, love, awe, mystery, fear, and power emerge from the conversation between aurèce vettier and the algorithm he trained on the visual record of his life.

theVERSEverse’s Elisabeth Sweet (@speciesofvalue) sat down with aurèce vettier to unpack the story behind this ethereal work. the full interview will be published in Le Random Editorial during Bright Moments Paris. for now, we are delighted to share a glimpse of this conversation with readers of conVERSEverse.

if you’re in Paris next week, please join aurèce vettier for a exhibition + cocktail party to celebrate le travail des rêves.

Bigaignon 18 Rue du Bourg-Tibourg, 75004, Paris. 20:30 – 23:00

poetry = public work of art

should poetry be a public good? Marie Howe - poet and former NY State Poet Laureate - once said, “Poetry stops us and gives us something in common. I still believe that we could get poetry more into the public world.” in this article, Shannon Chen See (@watchensee) explores the case for poetry as a public work of art through the lens of our recent involvement at IGNITE 2024, a public Art + Light Festival in Florida produced by MAD Arts and The Broward County Cultural Division.

at IGNITE, we played with new ways for the public to experience poetry with 3D holoboxes, and re-read POESÍA DE PROTESTA, a collection featuring 10 Spanish poems written by Hispanic women surrounding themes of protest in all its forms.

poetry in the wild

• no one captures the poetic versatility of beeswax quite like Astra Papachristodoulou. Astra is currently exhibiting two works in Words from the Wild: the Nature of Poetry at Royal Holloway University of London. visit Bee Swarm and Selected Variations for Bees now through March 24, 2024.

• Imperfect Lovers by Nathaniel Stern will make you wonder and lament the human condition to love. In this continuous, onchain performance, the Imperfect Lovers each allocate a portion of themselves to the other, always losing a bit of their balance in the process. they give until they have nothing left, and even then, they will try to give more. the quiet release of Imperfect Lovers is set for February 23.

• we’re celebrating the publication of SILENCE: LECTURES AND WRITINGS by Derek Beaulieu. the book is a visual response to John Cage’s SILENCE: LECTURES AND WRITINGS, a collection of essays building upon his iconic piece 4′33″. Beaulieu has deleted all the text except the punctuation marks—which visually represents breath, pauses and breaks.

• “Play 1966” is from Victoria Chang’s forthcoming book WITH MY BACK TO THE WORLD, to be published by The New Republic and set to release April 2, 2024.

reread: our 2023

In 2023, we curated and produced a major exhibition, POÈME SBJKT. With our wonderful partners aurèce vettier and L'Avant Galerie Vossen, we wrote and published a catalogue to go with it. In Paris on the left bank, at a rare book gallery called Librairie Métamorphoses, the exhibition lived from May to June, inviting all to consider the past, present, and future of a poem.

We eagerly accepted the invitation to curate an exhibition of poetry on Feral File, a critical platform in the digital and contemporary art space co-founded by Casey REAS. FeralVerse, poetry of the body and the earth, premiered during National Poetry Month 2023. Twenty important poets and artists collaborated to create the first collection of poetry on Feral File.

In line with long histories of protest poetry, we, with curator Gladys Garrote, organized POESÍA DE PROTESTA, an exhibition of poetry in Spanish written by women and visually interpreted by artists working in web3. Our dear friends at Refraction commissioned and exhibited Part 1 in Miami 2022. Part 2 exhibited at Proof of People NYC in 2023, thanks again to Refraction and another dear friend of theVERSEverse, VerticalCrypto.

We onboarded Allen Ginsberg to web3. With the support and guidance of his Estate, we explored the poetry and photographs of one of history’s greatest literary heroes with tools at the edge of technology. Unit London exhibited the inaugural work in a stunning online display.

Over the summer, we had an open call for submissions to our inaugural COMMUNITY ANTHOLOGY. Over 70 people submitted, and Odd Writings accepted our invitation to curate. Through George’s diligent work and the poets’ dedication, we published the anthology in early August.

none of this would have been possible without all our amazing partners or all of you.

gratitude to the Tezos Foundation for awarding us a $50,000 grant which will give us time + space to reread. the grant covers operating costs and planning the production of a very special event we have coming at the end of the year. special thanks to Valérie Whitacre for her stalwart effort and early belief in us.

thanks for being on this journey with us.

here’s to nurturing + cultivating poetry in 2024 🖤