Poetry plasters New Zealand and Nashville
Posterpoems will soon be plastered across 13 centres in New Zealand and inNashville, Tennessee, as part of an initiative by a national postercompany.
Phantom Billstickers has produced A1 posters featuringpoems by New Zealand poets Tusiata Avia and James Milne (aka LawrenceArabia) and by Tennessee poets Jeffery McCaleb and Michael White.
OnTuesday 2 June the poem posters will be placed nationwide – Whangarei,Auckland, Hamilton, Rotorua, New Plymouth, Gisborne, Napier, PalmerstonNorth, Wellington, Nelson, Christchurch, Dunedin and Invercargill –aswell as in Nashville.
New Zealand’s inaugural Poet Laureate,University of Auckland Associate Professor of English Michele Leggott,will help launch the initiative in Auckland. She will paste the firstposter poem, written by Samoan-New Zealand poet Tusiata Avia. Tusiatawill read the poem in front of a public gathering that will includestudents from Michele’s Poetry Off the Page class and the Masters ofCreative Writing paper, James Milne, and University of Auckland poetsand academics Selina Tusitala Marsh and Lisa Samuels.
Over the next six months, four poets will be “exhibited” monthly aspart of Phantom Billsticker’s commitment to supporting emerging andestablished poets. Forthcoming poets to be “postered” include MicheleLeggott, David Eggleton, William Direen, Otis Mace, Kevin Fraher andHilaire Campbell.
“In these tough times, we wanted to put some beauty and thoughtfulnessback into the streets of New Zealand,” says Jim Wilson, head of PhantomBillstickers, Ltd. “We are particularly proud of our national poets,both known and emerging, and we want to help spread their words soeveryone can enjoy them.”
“I welcome any effort to promote the beauty, playfulness and power ofpoetry, particularly when it helps take poems off the page and into theconsciousness of people going about their daily lives,” says MicheleLeggott.
The first poster will be pasted at 12pm on 2 June at a PhantomBillstickers site on Auckland’s Queen St, opposite the BritomartCentre. Refreshments will be provided. All welcome.