Inspace, 1 Crichton Street, Edinburgh, EH8 9AB. Thursday, 19 September 2013, 18:45.

Technology isn’t just changing the way poetry is produced and disseminated, and it isn’t just creating new media forms for poets to colonise. It’s also creating a context in which many techniques characteristic of experimental poetic practice have become commonplace. Join us as Syndicate curates a series of live performances, installations and dialogues at the raw intersection of avant-garde poetics, technology and cyberculture.

Performing tonight:: Sandra Alland / Steve Willey / Ian Davidson

WHO::

Sandra Alland is a writer, filmmaker, interdisciplinary artist and performer. She has published and presented her work throughout the UK, Europe, the US and Canada. In 2009, Edinburgh’s Forest Publications published Sandra’s chapbook of short fiction, Here’s To Wang, which went into its second printing in 2010. Sandra has published three books of poetry: Naturally Speaking (Toronto: espresso, 2012); Blissful Times (Toronto: BookThug, 2007); and Proof of a Tongue (Toronto: McGilligan, 2004). Sandra curates Cachín Cachán Cachunga Queer & Trans* Cabaret in Edinburgh, and was recently guest editor at Jacket2 for a special issue on Scottish poets. http://www.blissfultimes.ca.

Steve Willey lives in Whitechapel, London. His poetry has been widely anthologized including in: Dear World and Everyone In It (Bloodaxe, 2013); Better Than Language (Ganzfeld press, 2011); and City State (Penned In The Margins, 2009). His long-form poem Elegy (his debut collection) was published by Veer Books in July 2013, but you can’t get it yet. Steve enjoys working collaboratively and across different media, and in the past he has worked with the composer Edward Nesbit and the post-rock band Rumour Cubes on pieces that have been performed at the Wigmore Hall and at Glastonbury Music Festival respectively. Steve’s current poetic projects derive from a trip he took to Aida Refugee Camp in 2009, and a further visit in August 2013. He holds a PhD on the subject of Bob Cobbing 1950-1978: Poetry, Performance and the Institution, from Queen Mary, University of London. With Tom Bamford he runs the Benefits event series in London, and he is happy to be contacted via http://www.stevewilley.com.

Ian Davidson’s latest poetry collection, Partly in Riga (Shearsman 2010) was mostly written while on a residency in Latvia. His current project explores the ways that practices and ideas of movement and mobility, particularly those of humans, relate to contemporary writing. He has made extensive use of a seven syllable line, a quantity that always seems incomplete, and see the pamphlet Into Thick Hair (Wild Honey 2011) for an example. Other poetry collections include Harsh (Spectacular Diseases 2003), As if Only (Shearsman 2007) and At a Stretch (Shearsman 2004), and critical books include Ideas of Space in Contemporary Poetry (Palgrave 2007) and Radical Spaces of Poetry (Palgrave 2010).

Expect:: Innovative poetics, multi-media artworks, interactive performances, lively debate and sparkling wine.

About:: Syndicate is a unique initiative bringing together writers, musicians, artists and researchers working with and in response to digital technologies, new media and evolving network practices. It is organised by Lila Matsumoto, Jo L. Walton and Samantha Walton in collaboration with Inspace and with the support of the Edinburgh Fund’s Innovative Initiative Grant.