Sundress Academy for the Arts Presents "Mapping & Memory: Poetic Cartographies"

The Sundress Academy for the Arts is excited to present “Mapping & Memory: Poetic Cartographies,” a workshop led by Kenzie Allen on May 8^th, 2024, from 6:00-7:30 PM EST. This event will be held over Zoom. Participants can access the event at tiny.utk.edu/sundress (password: safta).

How does a poem teach us to read its map? How can memory allow us to swiftly navigate through vast terrains of time and space within the span of a poem? In this generative workshop inspired by Indigenous and extracanonical methods of mapmaking and storytelling, we’ll chart the literary cartographies of authors like Craig Santos Perez, Richard Siken, Pattiann Rogers, and more, to uncover new possibilities for using context-aware forms and patterns in books and individual poems.

Through a series of writing exercises, we’ll use memory, cultural inheritances, and geographic imagination to develop new markers and map legends toward making and expanding our own poetic landscapes. Participants should expect to finish the class having generated the start of several new poems, and with new ideas in hand for approaching poetry in both reading and writing.

While there is no fee to participate in this workshop, those who are able and appreciative may make donations directly to Kenzie Allen via PayPal. Her PayPal is @getkenzieallen.

Kenzie Allen, author of Cloud Missives (Tin House, 2024), is a Haudenosaunee poet and multimodal artist. A finalist for the national Poetry Series, she is the recipient of the James Welch Prize for Indigenous Poets, a 92NY Discovery Prize, and the 49^th Parallel Poetry Award.

This event is brought to you in part by grants provided by the Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry and the Tennessee Arts Commission.