From June 4th- August 26 I was very honored to be part of the exhibition Women and Other Wild Creatures: Matrilineal Tales along with Zinaida (Ukraine), Kateryna Babkina (Ukraine), Iryna Maksymova (Ukraine), Rita Maikova (Ukraine), Aya Shalkar (Kazakhstan/US), Yerke Abuova (Kazakhstan/US), and Susan Coyne (US) at Sapar Contemporary in New York City.
I deeply thank Nina Levent, curator & gallery director & her team, Joelle Araujo, galerie manager & all the interns for this nurturing & creative experience.
There is more info on my piece “Antediluvian Sympoiesis” here
Many thanks to Bernardine who came to visit the show & gave me the opportunity to talk about my work on her podcast “Beyond the Paint”. If you listen, please do not hesitate to review & comment!
Meanwhile, may you all be well & have a glorious end of summer, and get the latest on:
I am thrilled to be included in this wonderful group show at Sapar Contemporary. Women and Other Wild Creatures: Matrilineal Tales June 3, 2022- July 15, 2022 —extended to August 26 Opening reception Friday June 3, 6-8pm 9 NORTH MOORE, NEW YORK, NY 10013
Yes! that is tomorrow! — or today if you open this in the morning! So much looking looking forward to see you; it’s been too long!
Zinaida (Ukraine), Iryna Maksymova (Ukraine), Rita Maikova (Ukraine), Kateryna Babkina (Ukraine), Aya Shalkar (Kazakhstan/US),Yerke Abuova (Kazakhstan/US),
Nicole Peyrafitte (France/US) and Susan Coyne (US).
Curated by Nina Levent, Ph.D.
June 3, 2022- July 15, 2022
Opening reception on June 3, 6-8pm
Featuring installation + Video Antediluvian Sympoiesis pdf of installation: here
Sapar Contemporary is thrilled to present Women and Other Wild Creatures: Matrilineal Tales, a group exhibition of women artists who draw strength from the connection with the non-human nature, involving it in their healing practices and increasingly fantastical visions of human unity with nature. The show includes artists from Ukraine (Zinaida, Rita Maikova, Iryna Maksymova, poet Kateryna Babkina) and Kazakhstan (Aya Shalkar and Yerke Abuova), representing the gallery’s DNA, as well as works by French (Nicole Peyrafitte) and American (Susan Coyne) artist.
The inspiration for the exhibition came from seeing intergenerational caravans of grandmothers, mothers, daughters, and family pets migrating from the war zones, as well as the images of nature’s destruction in Ukraine: suffering trees, plants, animals of all kinds, and the whole steppe and wetland ecosystems – in addition to cultivated land. These images have been deeply felt at the gallery whose founders have family, friends, artists, and roots in Ukraine. The sense of terror brought to mind sources of strength available to women, connections that they forge across time and space, rituals recovered and re-invented in times of cataclysms. Ukrainian poet, Kateryna Babkina, contributed a poem she has written in March 2022, which was translated in English by Virlana Tkacz and Wanda Phipps for the exhibition. The poem opens with a line: Give me a brother who can protect me; woman is seeking protector and shelter, the sky responds with the final line of the poem: Make it yourself. You are on your own.
From June 4th — July 15, 2021 Galerie Simoncini —Luxembourg, presented the second extensive installment of Nicole Peyrafitte & Pierre Joris’ Domopoetics creations. The couple, who has shared life for three decades, moved in with their most recent KARSTIC ACTIONS/WORKS —paintings, texts, videos — & occupied the three levels of the gallery. — On the ground floor, the Karstic Refuge where their domestic & political processes interconnect & transform. — In the basement, the Sanctuary, neither holy nor secret, but table/altar for their intimate domopoetic works. — On the second floor, the Canopy, where the diversity & resilience of multi-species relations can be experienced. For the opening & the finissage live Karstic-Action performances were presented. Below are the two videos:
OPENING: Friday, June 4th at 6:00PM with an improvisation of Pascal Delalée on violin
FINISSAGE: July 15 2021 with Colin Toniello on keyboard
Hello everyone!
After a year & more sheltering at home in Brooklyn we are happy to head out to Europe, fully vaxxed, to pick up on gigs delayed by the pandemic. Four events are central, all taking place in Luxembourg:
1) our most recent KARSTIC ACTIONS/WORKS at Galerie Simoncini;
2) Pierre Receiving the Batty Weber Award;
3) the CNL celebrating his 75th birthday on 14 July (details to be announced)
4) the “finissage” of the KARSTIC ACTIONS/WORKS show on 15 July.
Voilà! Details below & looking forward to reconnect other that virtually.
1). Nicole Peyrafitte & Pierre Joris ACTIONS/TRAVAUX KARSTIQUES
June 4th — July 15, 2021 Opening with a Performance Action on Friday, June 4th at 6:00PM
This exhibition/performance of paintings, texts, videos will occupy the gallery’s three levels:
—Sanctuaire/Sanctuary: basement
—Abri/Shelter: street level
—Canopy/Canopée : upper floor Galerie Simoncini 6, Rue Notre Dame, Luxembourg.
For more details on this see: Communiqué de Presse Press Release
2) Just before the KARSTIC ACTIONS/WORKS, exhibition/performance, a long-delayed (because of covid) event will take place on 1 June: Pierre will receive the Batty Weber Prize (Luxembourg’s life-time achievement award in literature). The ceremony will take place at 7 p.m. at the CNL (Centre National de Littérature) in Mersch in the presence of Minister of Culture, Sam Tanson & the director of the CNL, Nathalie Jacoby. A laudatio will be read by Jean Portante, celebratory poems sung by Nicole Peyrafitte accompanied by Pascal Delalée on violin, & Pierre will read the essay he wrote for the occasion & which will be available as a pamphlet from the CNL (Various Variable Words Variably Arranged in the Form of a Celebratory Talk-Essay on Language & Luxembourg).
3) We’ll be back in Mersch on July 14 as the CNL has proposed to celebrate Pierre’s 75th birthday by creating an event that will include poetry readings & performances by Nicole & some others of our friends, a public interview of PJ by Florent Toniello for a future book, and more. Details to be announced.
4) Finally on 15 July, the finissage will happen at the galerie Simoncini, possibly with a final performance as we take down the paintings, pack the videos & get ready to return to Brooklyn.
Other news: Nicole’s —“Karstic-Action Je me dé-suffit/ Dé-suffice“: Official Selection of the 9th International Video Poetry Festival. The premiere of the festival will be on Sunday June 6th & will accessible to everyone in the entire world in the Video Art Zone 2021 section. —Things Fall Where They Lie /Les Choses Tombent où Elles Reposent:
is now available on VOD to rent/buy English subtitles / Sous-titres Français
—The Museum of the Women Library in Glasgow acquired the painting Nicole made during our performance at the CCA on 5th October 2016 as part of the Outside-In / Inside-Out poetry festival and symposium held in Glasgow and here it is
—Karstic Actions featured in Periodico de Poesia UNAM (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México)
Pierre’s
upcoming online events include:
— Workshop “Celan übersetzen” (FU Berlin, Literarisches Kolloquium Berlin), 14.-15. Juni 2021. This will be a zoom occasion. DTBA
— A Claude Pélieu Symposium in Paris to be held at the University of Chicago Center Paris, On 8/9 July. Still uncertain if this will be live or zoom. DTBA.
— Pierre’s two 2020 Celan books, Paul Celan: Microliths (Posthumous prose) (CMP) & Paul Celan: Memory Rose into Threshold Speech — Collected Earlier Poetry (FSG) have garnered quite some reviews. Here are links to some of these:
Indeed, all of us are ready for a healthy 2021. Truly hoping you have all made it through 2020 ok. We can’t complain, as we stayed healthy & productive throughout. Like for many of us, travelling gigs were cancelled though most only postponed or “zoomed”. Below, what’s coming up in the new year & some of our 2020 highlights. May justice, peace & health be on everyone’s schedule. If you are in NYC, remember that we will have to vote again & it is an important mayoral election. There is numerous candidates officially launching their campaigns — the Democratic primary is this 22 June & the general election 2 November. It is an important one since the NYC police department still needs to see serious deep changes. Profound & structural reforms are essential to address systemic racism, brutality & basic injustice. The word “Defunding” may scare liberals but there are real problems (financial, cultural, etc.) Just look at the NYPD budget & its opacity. As an exemple:
— Portugal’s total defense expenditure for 10.28 million people: $ 2.53 billion in 2020.
— NYC’s Police Department: for 8.3 million people, $11 billion from the City’s budget are allocated to NYPD’s operating budget.
Voting locally is super important and please join us in keeping the pressure on!
1 billion may have been “reallocated,” but 80% of NYPD’s members belong to a Union that officially endorsed the despicable & democratically ousted Trump.
As Bryan Stevenson, lawyer and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative says: “We cannot build our safety on punishment.”
Meanwhile, keep in touch, stay healthy & together we can Resist, Persist & Assist.
Bon anada, e schéint neit Joer!
Nicole & Pierre
A CRÊPE-COOK-ALONG chez Nicole & Pierre
JANUARY 1st, 2021 8 AM EST
If you missed our Crêpe-Cook-Along video on January 1st for the legendary Poetry Project’s 2021 New Year’s Day Marathon, which this year was a 24-hour continuous online broadcast featuring readings and performances from a global cast of more than 200 poets, writers, artists, musicians, dancers, and theatre-makers – devotees of the avant-garde and demimonde, proud visionaries and iconoclasts working at the edge across language, time, and place you can see it here & please don’t forget to contribute here. And if you’re really serious about cooking along with the video, download the list of necessary ingredients here.
DOMOPOETIC KARSTIC-ACTION EXHIBITION June 4 – July 7th 2021 Nicole Peyrafitte & Pierre Joris’s new domopoetic works are based on three word-concepts: Les nouveaux travaux domopoétiques de Nicole Peyrafitte & Pierre Joris s’appuient sur trois mots-concepts
RESIST PERSIST ASSIST
Actions paintings/Videos /Textes Galerie Simoncini — 6, rue Notre Dame L-2240 Luxembourg
Pierre received the 2020 Prix Batty Weber, the Luxembourg national literary prize that is awarded every three years since 1987 to a Luxembourgish writer for the entirety of his work. Interview by Florent Toniello in Woxxx. His Fox-trails, -tales, & -trots: Poems & Proses was shortlisted for the Luxembourg National Book Awards.
The British daily, The Morning Star, named Microliths one of its two literary “Books of the Year.”
—“Karstic-Action Je me dé-suffit/ Dé-suffice“: Official Selection of the 
