Poetry of Place
Rick is one of Dudley’s Time Rebels. He catalysed and collaboratively convenes an online writing group with people who live in and around Dudley. The group first started meeting in the first lockdown of 2020 and connected people through creative writing.
In response to the invitation to explore ways that we might unlock imagination and nurture long-term thinking in Dudley, Rick co-designed an experiment with other Time Rebels, grown around his love of poetry. Below he describes this experiment, including plans for Do Fest Dudley 2021, and explains why he is using poetry as a Time Rebel tool.
What if you were able to explore your town or High Street using poetry?
What if your view of that place were changed through poetry?
What if your shop was gifted a poem celebrating your place on the High Street and helped you to think differently about the future of the High Street?
Well, all these things are possible and will be taking place in Dudley High Street from the Spring of 2021 onwards.
There will be 3 phases of activity to support this Time Rebel idea, each one building to a slightly different outcome, but all three leading people to view their High Street in a different light.
Phase 1: Establishing a Rebel in Residence presence on the High Street
This involves spending a series of days leading up to Do Fest Dudley 2021 present in the High Street offering people the chance to write poems about Dudley and the High Street as a place. The poems will be used to form a visual Poetry Paperchain, which will be displayed in the CoLab space and out on the street whenever writing sessions are in play. This offers people the opportunity to do some creative writing and also gives visibility to a Time Rebel on the High Street itself. The plan is to position directly outside the CoLab Space and also across the road in front of the “Bostin” sign. Poems will be a set structure to encourage those people who have never written poetry to have a go. The focus will be both on current place and also a future vision of the High Street.
Phase 2: A poetry writing workshop during Do Fest, again on the street for visibility and accessibility.
This will be a similar way of engaging the public in poetry as an artform and challenging them to think about the spaces around them in the High Street. Poems can again be collected for the Poetry Paperchain and added to as Do Fest Dudley runs over the weekend.
Phase 3: Write poems about and for the places on the High Street.
In exchange for time taken talking to and observing the work spaces on the High Street, poems will be gifted to each participating shop; a poem written in response to their shop or business. This will be coupled with a photograph of the front of their shop and can be used by the shop owners to display in their window — a form of High Street exhibition, but on a shop-by-shop basis.
The idea is to build on the Time Rebel presence of phases 1 and 2 and use poetry to break down barriers of communication and foster a community spirit. The poetry response will also challenge perspectives of the future of the High Street, asking provocations of the shop owners about the way the High Street could be different from the way it is today.
When we talk of Time Rebels, we land on the idea that people need to experience a different perspective of a place, themselves, a community or society as a whole, a vision of the past or present that builds confidence in changes being positive and life affirming. Connection through art can lead to profound and long-lasting perspective shifts, especially if the subject matter is personal to the viewer or creator of that art. Poetry is a good way for people to connect with themselves, their own opinions on a theme without really realising that they are doing so. It can, therefore, create a much profound impression than other art forms.
Inviting people to write poetry about a place evokes memories and creates visions of past and future states. Therefore, it sits very much within the remit of Time Rebel time travel, where we will be actively asking people to reflect on the present and predict a future based on their own experience.
A subtle exercise of writing poetry in a public space and encouraging others to get involved invites curiosity, not only in the participants, but also in the person delivering the exercise. Being able to observe and record the reactions of people to the invitation, see how they respond to the exercise itself and gauge how the experience made them feel/change will offer powerful insights through detectorism. We will be able to see if people feel more connected to a space or others, if there are links that have been forged through participation and we will be able to notice patterns that emerge around engagement, writing, sharing and curiosity. When we place ourselves where others can interact, then we will learn a whole raft of things about willingness and desire for change.
This poetry writing is about connecting and sharing, encouraging others through doing and about establishing a creative presence on the High Street where at the moment, there is no visibility of one. Underlying this activity is about showing the people of Dudley that things can be different, that a creative, vibrant atmosphere can be created using nothing more than enthusiasm and application. It empowers people to make change and to see things from a different perspective, one that focuses on positive outcomes and change for the better.
