The 23rd edition of the poesiefestival berlin will take place from June 17 to June 23, 2022 at the Academy of Arts on the Hanseatenweg. With this year’s theme of “All that poetry,” the festival will present a wide spectrum of international contemporary poetry, opening with a contemporary lyric voice from Ukraine.
Far from being “niche,” poetry represents one of today’s most interesting and experimental art forms – one that touches thousands of people around the world through its versatility, diversity, and precision. After two years of pandemic restrictions, the 23rd poesiefestival berlin will take a panoramic view of the art of language.
Organized by the Haus für Poesie, the poesiefestival will expand the social relevance of poetry in readings, performances, discussions, exhibitions, workshops, and artistic interventions – revealing connections and affinities between poetry and music, sound art, visual art, film, dance, theater, and digital media.
As per tradition, the festival will open with Weltklang, a multilingual sound experience of international poetry. Here, poets read their work in their original languages, while the audience follows along with translations printed in a reader. This year’s Weltklang reading will feature an author from Ukraine (to be announced), Raymond Antrobus (JAM/GBR), Agustín Fernández Mallo (SP), Dorothea Grünzweig (GER) and Julia Wong Kcomt (PER), among others.
The 2022 Berlin Poetry Lecture will be held by Michèle Métail (FRA). In this lecture, Métail will trace the history of her own work in a kind of wandering inspired by the flâneurs of Berlin. In so doing, Métail will sketch a poetics of the in-between in which the poem transforms into a “riddle with multiple solutions.”
Aras Ören‘s long poems “Was will Niyazi in der Naunynstraße,“ “Der kurze Traum aus Kagithane,“ and “Die Fremde ist auch ein Haus“ (“What does Niyazi want in Naunyn Street,“ “The brief dream from Kağıthane,“ and “The Stranger is also a House“) – known as the “Berlin Trilogy” – will be adapted for the stage by Björn Kuhligk. These poems tell of the first generation of Turkish “guest workers” and of their lives in 1970s Kreuzberg, marked by poverty, degeneration, and political upheaval.
This year’s reVERSible will spotlight poetry from four successor states of the former Yugoslavia: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro, and Serbia. This translation workshop centers dialogue and exchange, as poets from these states and German-language poets translate one another. The festival will then present the translations, insights from the workshop, and an in-depth poetry discussion in a single evening.
Poetry in Education will offer an extensive participatory program, including an advanced training for mediators of poetry, workshops for school classes, a collaborative, collective chain poem, young poets’ poetry readings, an inclusive exhibition project, and much more.
Committed fans of poetry can warm up for the festival proper with Poets’ Corner – Poetry in the Districts, which will take place between June 12 and June 16 and includes eleven readings with dozens of Berlin-based poets.
The festival exhibition AI ANCESTORS will launch as early as June 14. Exploring speculative and sustainable ways of existence through body, poetry, and sound, this exhibition will invite visitors to “sensually feel more tender futures,“ says curator Rike Scheffler.
The poesiefestival berlin has taken place every year since its beginning in 2000 and is the largest of its kind in Europe, bringing around 150 renowned poets and artists from all over the world to Berlin each year. In addition to the medium of the book, poetry has long sought out other forms of presentation, experimenting with theater, performance, music, dance, film, and digital media.
The poesiefestival berlin is a project of the Haus für Poesie in cooperation with the Academy of Arts and is supported by the Hauptstadtkulturfonds.
Presented by ASK HELMUT, Deutschlandfunk Kultur, BÜCHERmagazin, EXBERLINER, KUNSTFORUM International, Literaturport, rbbKultur, taz and tip Berlin.
6/17–6/23/2022
23rd poesiefestival berlin
Academy of Arts
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin
Warm-up Events
6/12–6/16/2022
Poets’ Corner – Poetry in the Districts
6/14/2022 | 6 p.m.
Festival exhibition opening: AI ANCESTORS
Images/texts can be found in the press section at: https://poesiefestival.org/en/press/
For further information please contact
Haus für Poesie
Presse- und Öffentlichkeitsarbeit
Tel: 030. 48 52 45 24
E-Mail: presse@haus-fuer-poesie.or
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