The concept of transitioning from one culture to another and the subsequent creation of a new cultural identity has been described as “transculturation” by the esteemed Cuban scholar, Fernando Ortiz Fernández, in 1940. The title “Transcultural Visual Poetry” encapsulates the essence of this project, signifying the process of blending different calligraphic styles, each intimately connected to a specific language and culture. Through this synthesis, I aim to visualize a transcultural representation of a poem.
Project Title: Transcultural Visual Poetry
Date Completed: 2021
Medium: Ink wash on paper
Size: 22x30cm
“Anche questa notte passerà.”
Giuseppe Ungaretti
“The most beautiful sea hasn’t been crossed yet.”
Nazim Hikmat
“Beyond time or place I keep the faith.”
Gabriela Mistral
“Nothing can ever happen twice.”
Wislawa Szymborska
“We must love one another or die.”
W.H.Auden
“Don’t plant thorns in my land.
Tomorrow, you may come to me barefoot.”
Ghada alSamman
“The weight of the world is love.”
Allen Ginsberg
“I am in need of music.”
Elizabeth Bishop
“Ho bisogno di poesia”
Alda Merini
“Forget love
I want to die
In your yellow hair”
Richard Brautigan
“Keep the flight in mind,
The bird may die.”
Forough Farrokhzad
“I’m only a love poem
in the body of a woman.”
Alexandra Vasiliu
“We look at the world, once, in childhood.
The rest is memory.”
Louise Gluck
“Sólo tú y yo,
sólo tú y yo,
amor mío,
lo escuchamos”
Pablo Neruda
“Then I teach myself to live again “
Anna Akhmatova
“I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul”
William Ernest Henley
“Abbiamo, dopo di te, bevuto in ben altre cantine.”
Vincenzo Cardarelli
“Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.”
Maya Angelou
“Be happy for this moment, this moment is your life.”
Omar Khayyam
“I began with your first glance.”
Ahmad Shamluo
