Description
Poetry. Asian & Asian American Studies. In a country renowned to be possessive of its language—France—Yuko Otomo composed her manifesto ANONYMOUS LANDSCAPE. There are no raised fists, no resentments, no confrontations, and only a modicum of regret. Released rather than frustrated by her inability to name things in that proud tongue, she leads the reader to understand her reunification with all creation, as if returned to the Garden prior to the delegation of appellation. An act of reverse alienation. Her immodest proposition is rendered in the most modest of dictions. There are 200, call them sub-poems, each with an integrity of sometimes aphorism, imagery, irony, or moving simplicity. Their austerities match the austerity of her persuasion. Their gem-likeness has the credibility of lived thought. Her sensitivity to words and the demands of craft, not by chance, renders us an implausible beauty.
Author Bio
Yuko Otomo is a visual artist and poet of Japanese origin. She also writes art criticism, essays & translations. Her visual art, which focuses on the study of "pure abstraction," has been shown at Tribes Gallery, Anthology Film Archives Courthouse Gallery, ABC No Rio, Brecht Forum, Gallery 128, Knitting Factory, Vision Festival, and elsewhere. She has read her work at New York City venues including St. Mark's Poetry Project, Bowery Poetry Club, Tonic, The Stone, Knitting Factory, NY Public Library, Issue Project Room, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Nest, Pink Pony, Nuyorican Poet's Cafe, and in Germany, France and Japan. Her books include ANONYMOUS LANDSCAPE (Lithic Press, 2019), Garden: Selected Haiku (Beehive Press), Genesis (Sisyphus Press), Small Poems (Ugly Duckling Presse), The Hand of the Poet (UDP), STUDY & Other Poems on Art (UDP), Elements (Feral Press), KOAN (New Feral Press) & FROZEN HEATWAVE (Luna Bisonte Prods, 2017) a poetry collaboration project with Steve Dalachinksy. She lives in New York City.
Author City: NEW YORK CITY, NY USA