Kim's quirky, material culture twist on Muldoon's "Incantata"

Kim Humphries is a frequent contributor to the Poetry Scores Art Invitational, and we are delighted to have him back for the Incantata invitational (6-9 p.m. Friday, Nov. 11 at Mad Art). Kim's work often encodes a story worth the telling, so we asked him to do some telling about "Lucozade" (the image above is of the commercial artifact, not Kim's piece, which is in progess).

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Kim Humphries writes:

Initially Muldoon’s “Incantata”—a tribute to artist Mary Farl Powers—intimidated me. I saw it as a complex, roiling charge into an allusive and at times elusive roller coaster ride that included tunnels too dark in which to truly see, running at a speed that created blinding blurs where only the captured bits added up to anything truly tangible. Once I became comfortable with that—the experience that was the poem—with the words and sometimes gibberish that were painted with an intoxicated confidence leaving much to fill in, and imagine, or to not bother to imagine at all. It was then that I was able to begin mining the work for some way to contribute to the visual puzzle the “Poetry Scores” artists would be creating.

Not being one to reiterate or echo another’s work I looked for something to grab onto that would amplify and respect some small portion of the work—something that spoke to the nature of this beast. Frankly, I had to look up Lucozade. I rolled past it on the first couple of reads. Lucozade—it sounded primordial like a rare stone, like an element. To my surprise it is a sports drink from the UK. Blood and water are cited in the poem and this marvelous drink, like those, becomes an essential element of life. That was just the quirky twist I was looking for, something to have a bit of fun with as Muldoon seems to have had writing this quirky, colorful piece. As my work often speaks through bits of material culture this was a perfect match.

I procured a dozen bottles of Lucozade and am in the process of creating a well-engineered (the company is a Formula One racing sponsor, after all) presentation box for one bottle that will sit on a shelf at the appropriate location within the gallery. This piece will be part of the silent bid auction. The remaining eleven bottles will become a limited edition group identified by an artist’s label. They will be for sale in the gallery for immediate purchase at a reasonable price throughout the evening. 100 percent of the proceeds from the sale of the boxed and editioned Lucozade will benefit “Poetry Scores.”

The cross-disciplinary roots of “Poetry Scores” are truly impressive. This season’s panel discussion, live performance at the Touhill Performing Arts Center and the gallery exhibition / benefit cum Exquisite Corpse promises to be fantastic undertaking building on the multi-year—this is the 6th poetry score and invitational—history of this set of unique, fertile collaborations.

Kim Humphries
10/5/11

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Kim Humphries at Bruno David Gallery