The Scream Literary Festival Mainstage

I performed on the mainstage at the Scream Literary Festival in Toronto on July 13th, 2009. The year before I had performed at a smaller venue at the same festival with Paul Dutton and that worked out so well that the organizers asked us to repeat (and expand) last years performance. The event takes place in a big outdoor theatre in High Park. We started off with the same poems as last year, Kit Talk by Paul and Thou Shalt Not Morgan by me. We then proceeded to do a new sound poem by Dutton, written for the occasion, and ended on three poems from the dictator-series- Pol Pot (Pantún), Batista og Swing Ding.

Click here to see and hear.

Stanza literature-bar in Malmö

I went to Malmö, Sweden, at the end of March, 2009, to read at Stanza literature-bar. The event took place at Inkonst art-happening-house, and amongst other participants was multilingual poet Cia Rinner, the grand old king of Swedish concrete, Bengt Emil Johnson, his wonderfully performative wife, Kerstin Ståhl, and the poetry/arts group 3 Advokater, with Pär Thörn, Peder Alexis Olsson, Ola Stahl, and Calle Lindh. I read from the dictator-series, the crisis sonnet and two dialect-poems (danish and swedish (skånska)).

Click here to see.

The Poetry Week in Turku

The Poetry Week in Turku in 2008 was from November 3-9, and I performed on wednesday the 5th, at a place called Klubi. Others performing were poets Jonimatti Joutsijärvi and Olli-Pekka Tennilä, dancer Satu Tuittila og the viseo-musicians of Pink Twins. J.P. Sipilä recorded the videos and did the production (there are some effects here and there).

The festival homepage is here.

Click here for my percentage of the festivities.

I should probably mention that I had a mean case of the flu while performing, as well as both before and after.

4th International Nýhil Poetry Festival

The 4th International Nýhil Poetry Festival was held at the National Theatre in Reykjavík, the Nordic House and in the National Museum of Ancient Things. I read at the first mentioned scene. Participating: 12 Icelandic poets and 6 foreign – the foreign guests being Hanno Millesi, Sureyyya Evren, Ann Cotten, Ida Börjel, Nina Sös Vinther og Morten Sökilde. Beside the traditional poetry parties on friday and saturday, there was a scandinavian reading in the Nordic House, a panel discussion about publishing in the National Museum, and a panel about poetry in a commercial world in the Nordic House, in which I also participated.

Here is more information about the festival (in Icelandic) and here you can see my reading.

The Scream Literary Festival: Lexiconjury Revival

Lexiconjury Revival was a part of The Scream Literary Festival in Toronto, July 8. Among participants were Natalie Walschotts, Alixandra Bamford, Steve Venright, Sharon Harris and Paul Dutton. I read two poems with Paul Dutton, of Four Horsemen fame (and individual fame, of course), and a new poem written from the works of Æri-Tobbi, Úr órum Tobba – as well as doing a few poems from the dictator series. Amazingly enough I was called back for an encore, adding another dictator poem to the mix, and Höpöhöpö Böks. The day after I was asked to do a sound-poetry version of Kevin Connolly’s Plenty, – with about 25 minutes to spare. That spawned Eitt allsherjar ógurlega mikið.

The festival homepage is here. And here you can read about Lexiconjury.

Click here to see the videos.

Nordic Summer í Vilnius

The Nordic Summer was held in Vilnius and Jurbarkas, Lithuania, June 12-15, 2008. The theme was “The writer and rebellion”. Among the participants were Vigdis Hjorth, Maja Lundgren, Tuomas Kyrö, Marcelijus Martinaitis, Jaroslavas Melnikas, Agné Zakralyté, Andrius Jakuciunas et al. The first reading took place at the bar Neringa in Vilnius, and the recordings are from there, but I also read at the Jurbarkas Country Museum and the night club Monopolis. The poems I read were, in this order: The First of Many Revolutions (translation of Fyrst ótal byltinga); Snurvoðin snýst á veggjunum; Pol Pot (Pantún); Batista og Swing Ding.

Click here for the shebang.

Badtaste4ever

Badtaste4ever was held in the Bozar arts centre in Brussels, on april 30, 2008, curated by poet Sjón and singer Einar Örn Benediktsson. This was an all Icelandic event, with visuals, performances, music and performance literature. The literature part had (besides me) Kristín Svava Tómasdóttir, Sjón, Byrkir (from Forgotten Lores), and Örvar Þóreyjarson-Smárason.

The festival homepage can be found here and here you can click to see my part in the whole she-bang.

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FlarfFest08

The Flarf festival of 2008 was held at Dixon Place and the legendary Bowery Poetry Club in New York, on april 24-26, 2008. I’ve been associated with the movement since I wrote about them for Tímarit Máls og menningar in 2005, and Katie Degentesh visited the Nýhil poetry festival in Iceland in 2006.

I performed at both venues. At Dixon Place I read Pol Pot (Pantún), and an english rendition, Pol Pot (Not a Pantoum). At the Bowery Poetry Club I read Thou Shalt not Morgan, accompanied by Drew Gardner’s Flarfestra. I also played guitar with the band, when not reading – as well as having read the part of James Brown in Mitch Highfill’s play, The Secret History of the ’60′s (at Dixon Place).

The festival homepage can be found here and here you can see my part of the shenanigans.

Lyd + litteratur

The Aarhus poetry festival, Lyd+Litteratur was arranged by Geiger publishing and Litteratur på scenen, and held april 9-11, 2008. It had performances from, amongst others, Jaap Blonk , Claus Beck-Nielsen Memorial and Lars Skinnebach, who read with musician. I performed the first two nights. On the first night I read some sound poetry unaccompanied, and the latter I read Nailsoup I-VI, computer assisted.

The festival homepage can be found here , and here you can click for videos of my part of the hoopla.

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Oslo poesifestival

The Oslo Poetry Festival was held on november 2-4, 2007. It was a grand event with readings, lectures, movies and music. Among the poets performing were Kenneth Goldsmith, Derek Beaulieu, Ulf Karl Olov Nilsson (with the Njurmännen), Lone Hørslev et al.

The festival homepage can be found here , but you can click here for recordings of my part of the hellfire.

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Other readings

Here you can find individual readings of various types, amongst others Pol Pot read on Icelandic TV, Christian Bök reading my Höpöhöpö Böks, and me reading with rockband Reykjavík! at the Nýhil poetry festival 2006.
Click here .