4/22/17

This was the final placement of the poster.  The brick didn’t allow the butcher paper to blend in, and the area is a common thoroughfare despite being a bit tucked away.  The poster is underneath the window from the Cafe Nerman, right across the way from the Central Shop.

4/22/17

Fortunately, I had a contingency plan in place if the WWI Museum plan went pear-shaped.  I had made a spray-painted poster on Friday that could be harmlessly posted wherever I wanted with sticky-tack.  This one I tried placing a couple different areas on campus.  I felt the color contrast between the butcher paper and the concrete wall wasn’t strong enough, so I moved the poster.

4/22/17

For this final project, I used another quote from a letter from Wilfred Owen to Siegfried Sassoon, and I felt an appropriate place to put the quote would be outside the National WWI Museum under the Liberty Memorial.  This placement was more nerve-wracking than before because I was aware I could be told to leave or yelled at.  And certainly, while I was working, there were dirty looks thrown my way, and someone even came up and chatted with me about what I was doing.  I was rushing the stencil because I was nervous, and the turnout wasn’t great.  It is somewhat legible, but was not likely to last long.

4/20/17 An answer to the question posited

Dearest of all Friends,         Here is an address which will serve for a few days. The sun is warm, the sky is clear, the waves are dancing fast & bright . . . But these are not Lines written in Dejection [opening lines of Shelley's `Stanzas, written in dejection, near Naples']. Serenity Shelley never dreamed of crowns me. Will it last when I shall have gone in Caverns & Abysmals such as he never reserved for his worst daemons?         Yesterday I went down to Folkestone Beach and into the sea, thinking to go through those stanzas & emotions of Shelley's to the full. But I was too happy, or the Sun was too supreme. Moreover there issued from the sea distraction, in the shape, Shape I say, but lay no stress on that, of a Harrow boy, of superb intellect & refinement; intellect because he hates war more than Germans; refinement because of the way he spoke of my Going, and of the Sun, and of the Sea there; and the way he spoke of Everything. In fact, the way he spoke –         And now I am among the herds again, a Herdsman; and a Shepherd of sheep that do not know my voice.         Tell me how you are.         With great & painful firmness I have not said you goodbye from England. If you had said in the heart or brain you might have stabbed me, but you said only in the leg [Sassoon annotates this letter: "I had told him I would stab him in the leg if he tried to return to the Front."]; so I was afraid.         Perhaps if I "write" anything in dug-outs or talk in sleep a squad of riflemen will save you the trouble of buying a dagger.                    Goodbye W. E. O.

Wilfred Owen to Siegfried Sassoon, September 1, 1918

My dear Sassoon,          When I had opened your envelope in a quiet corner of the Club Staircase, I sat on the stairs and groaned a little, and then went up and loosed off a gourd, Gothic vacuum of a letter, which I "put by" (as you would recommend for such effusions) until I could think over the thing without grame. [Sassoon cannot explain this word.]          I have also waited for this photograph.          Show some rich anger if you will. I thank you; but not on this paper only, or in any writing. You gave – with what Christ, if he had known Latin & dealt in oxymoron, might have called Sinister Dexterity. I imagined you were entrusting me with some holy secret concerning yourself. A secret, however, it shall be until such time as I shall have climbed to the housetops, and you to the minarets of the world.          Smile the penny! This Fact has not intensified my feelings for you by the least – the least grame. Know that since mid-September, when you still regarded me as a tiresome little knocker on your door, I held you as Keats + Christ + Elijah + my Colonel + my father-confessor + Amenophis IV in profile.          What's that mathematically?          In effect it is this: that I love you, dispassionately, so much, so very much, dear Fellow, that the blasting little smile you wear on reading this can't hurt me in the least.          If you consider what the above Names have severally done for me, you will know what you are doing. And you have fixed my Life – however short. You did not light me: I was always a mad comet; but you have fixed me. I spun round you a satellite for a month, but I shall swing out soon, a dark star in the orbit where you will blaze. It is some consolation to know that Jupiter himself sometimes swims out of Ken!          To come back to our sheep, as the French never say, I have had a perfect little note from Robt. Ross, and have arranged a meeting at 12.30 on Nov. 9th. He mentioned staying at Half Moon St., but the house is full. . . .          What I most miss in Edinburgh (not Craig & Lockhart) is the conviviality of the Four Boys (L. vivre – to live). Someday, I must tell how we sang, shouted, whistled and danced through the dark lanes through Colinton; and how we laughed till the meteors showered around us, and we felt calm under the winter stars. And some of us saw the pathway of the spirits for the first time. And seeing it so far above us, and feeling the good road so safe beneath us, we praised God with louder whistling; and knew we loved one another as no men love for long.          Which, if the Bridge-players Craig & Lockhart could have seen, they would have called down the wrath of Jahveh, and buried us under the fires of the City you wot of.          To which also it is time you committed this letter. I wish you were less undemonstrative, for I have many adjectives with which to qualify myself. As it is I can only say I am          Your proud friend, Owen

Wilfred Owen to Siegfried Sassoon, November 5, 1917

4/18/17

The final flour stencil was done at the playground in Gillham park.  I had to move quickly here - there were many parents around who were looking nervously at me, understandably, and I was nervous about them yelling at me.  I did my stencil quickly and left quickly.  

4/19/18

This is another quote from a letter from Wilfred Owen to Siegfried Sassoon.  The medium used was flour, and it was placed on the front stoop of St. James Catholic Church in Hyde Park, Kansas City.  

4/18/17

The end result of the spray painting chipboard signs hanging on my studio wall.

4/18/17

Chipboard letters painted with spray paint and fixed to the retaining wall with sticky tack.  the letters are placed directly facing the exit of the foundation studios with the most traffic, and combined with the color contrast, noticeability is very high.  The quote is from a letter from Wilfred Owen to Siegfried Sassoon in 1918.  Both are well-known World War One poets and known to be attracted to men.  When reading Owen’s letters, it becomes evident that he was deeply in love with Sassoon.  It feels important, in an age when LGBT people can afford to be more public, to air these private and personal words and celebrate them.

4/18/17

Process photos from spray-painting signs onto chipboard with the paper stencils.  

4/14/17

Here are some images from the night before the poem path printing, when I found that using a wire strainer was a really effective way of dry media stenciling.

4/15/17

4/15/17

4/15/17

The next place I went to print my poem path was in the city, on Cherokee Street in south St. Louis city.  I placed the poem outside a bakery that I knew the owners of and asked permission beforehand.  The urban setting was much less protected than the non-urban, and the letters disintegrated much more quickly.

4/15/17

The first place I went to place the poetry path was Creve Coeur Lake Park in St. Louis.  There is a lovely drip spring there that I thought would be appropriate to lead people to with the words.  Printing was an easy process this time around; using a strainer to evenly and finely sprinkle medium was a really good idea.  I used pure coffee grounds, and there was no charcoal mixed in.  The charcoal and the strainer did not get along.  As I got in my car to leave, I saw someone examining my work and taking pictures of it.

4/11/17

A couple of process photos of the light experiment using shadows to project a portion of the poem.  For this, I went to the playground area and found a spot where the poem’s shadows would be legible.  Once again, very pleased with the results.