This Month in Creativity
This is the sort of thing that I devote some time to pretty much everyday, at the office:
I present... the "Elkphrasis." A still-in-progress devotional ekphrastic mega-poem substrated by the very image that it takes as its inspiration.
("Why the elk poster?" you might ask. Well, I don't know if I can answer that question, precisely, but, I can tell you this: at some point, back when I was in the Boy Scouts (sigh), we had some kind of it-must-have-been-fund-raising shindig where stuff was auctioned off. Most of said stuff was camping related, but also amidst everything was this poster of an illustration of a bugling elk in front of some mountains. At the end of the auction, I had the elk poster. It lived on my wall for a couple years, once I got my own bedroom. I don't actually remember if I brought it to college with me or not, and I'm fairly certain that I didn't take it to Boston, but somehow, I wound up bringing it with me to Miami, where I never, in three years, displayed it. But, upon reconsidering the elk earlier this summer, I decided that it was, at least for me, utterly free of irony, going so far as to believe that it is, in fact, ironic-enjoyment-proof. Which is pretty special.)
The ur-elk
The Elkphrasis, as of 7/20/2010
I present... the "Elkphrasis." A still-in-progress devotional ekphrastic mega-poem substrated by the very image that it takes as its inspiration.
("Why the elk poster?" you might ask. Well, I don't know if I can answer that question, precisely, but, I can tell you this: at some point, back when I was in the Boy Scouts (sigh), we had some kind of it-must-have-been-fund-raising shindig where stuff was auctioned off. Most of said stuff was camping related, but also amidst everything was this poster of an illustration of a bugling elk in front of some mountains. At the end of the auction, I had the elk poster. It lived on my wall for a couple years, once I got my own bedroom. I don't actually remember if I brought it to college with me or not, and I'm fairly certain that I didn't take it to Boston, but somehow, I wound up bringing it with me to Miami, where I never, in three years, displayed it. But, upon reconsidering the elk earlier this summer, I decided that it was, at least for me, utterly free of irony, going so far as to believe that it is, in fact, ironic-enjoyment-proof. Which is pretty special.)
The ur-elk
The Elkphrasis, as of 7/20/2010
5 Comments:
I dunno, it's like I've always said, there's a fine line in between substrated ekphrasis and out-and-out palimpsest.
I wonder what the words say??
I agree with Jack. Could we see what one or two of the word panels say?
I think you may have hit on a workable up-sell for the Poem Depot, too, if you're willing to ekphra-size other people's posters on demand. Though this would be rather more time intensive.
It's incredibly time intensive! By rough estimate, it's going to take about 85 poems total to cover the whole thing. I've done 22 so far, it about as many days.
Wait, cover the whole thing? But then you won't be able to see the elk...
Part of the larger idea for the thing, once its done, would to display it on a light board, that reader/viewers could turn on and off, so that, hopefully, with light shining through it, the elk would actually out-muscle the poems, and be kind of a ghost-image that makes it hard to read the poems, and then with light back out the poem-surface would be readable.
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