Process Notes
Laura Christiansen on Collaboration
In my artwork, I paint on found portraits and snapshots, cancelling parts of images and conjuring new illusions– all of which are further recreated when combined with a poem.
I invited Marjorie Thomsen and Christine Poreba to write in response to my work. These two pairings are part of a book project involving several authors. In 2019, I plan to publish a limited edition of this unique project. To follow along and learn more, please visit my website and subscribe: www.LauraChristensen.net
Christine Poreba on Collaboration
I felt a kinship with Laura’s work from the start. The emotional tenor of her piece, Here Then Today and Far Away, immediately resonated with my own poetic voice. Laura’s request to include the eye in some fashion helped give a place to begin. The apparatus of the piece made me think of Shakespeare’s “all the world’s a stage” and so I re-read the monologue and began to freewrite using phrases from the monologue and descriptive elements of Laura’s piece. After several drafts, the poem felt complete.
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Laura Christensen is a visual artist who transforms vintage photographs. Her work has received several awards, including two Artists’ Resource Trust Grants, and two Individual Artist Grants from the Cultural Council of Northern Berkshires. She has exhibited her work widely for over 20 years. Recent exhibits include shows at Bennington Museum, The Arts Center of the Capital Region, and Simmons College. Pairings of her art and writings-in-response have been published in Clarkesworld, carte blanche, and Rattle. She lives in western Massachusetts.
Christine Poreba’s poems have appeared in numerous journals, including Subtropics, The Southern Review, and The Sun Magazine, and various anthologies. Her book, Rough Knowledge, was awarded the Philip Levine Prize. She lives in Tallahassee, Florida with her husband and their young son.