The River Has No Colour – Lee Campbell’s latest exciting project
After a short break from Liberated Words, I find myself swept up in the poetic energy and dynamic narrative (on the page and in real life) of artist, performance poet, experimental filmmaker and senior lecturer at the University of the Arts, London – Lee Campbell.
Besides a vast personal output (to be featured soon) Lee is the founder and curator of Homo Humour (see The BFI website, October 6th for the next iteration) which, screened worldwide, is ‘the first project of its kind on contemporary queer male film and moving image practices that explore humour and LGBTQ+ storytelling’. He also started POW! Play on Words, featuring performance poetry and film.
He has now launched an exciting new project The River has no Colour – which expands upon all things riverine through poetry and film. The title, as some of you may know, is taken from the richly resourced and worded debut pamphlet from British poet Jessica Taggart Rose. Lee invited me to be part of the project after seeing my film Nocturne for a Lighterman at Absurdah film festival in Sheerness recently, and I am really honoured and excited to be included.
In discussing poetry inspired by rivers, it is impossible not to reference Dart (2002)by Alice Oswald, where she documented river workers’ conversations (over three years) and created a ‘voice of the river’ in verse and prose from source to sea. You might say that Taggart Rose’s work is a type of update of this, providing an example of how to navigate (literally and metaphorically) the theme. It centers on the River Seine and its many apparitions as mythic goddess, environmental harbinger, political and historical vein (I would add since the arrival of the Normans); and is also translated into French by Claire Durand-Gasselin. This ‘doubled’ relationship also echoes the sense of endless flow and interpretation: the river (and the river of words) that we are drawn to and geographically formed by, with all its trades, accents, moods, tidal ranges etc. etc.
There are many rivers that run in our blood: in my case the Thames is deeply engrained on many fronts – for example, some of my ancestors were lightermen (bargemen) and others further up the river; whilst other rivers also feature in my past, which I will include in TREE my slow-growing poetic family history project. And in London the Thames, though a lifeline, and a source of contemplation and escape, has a dark nature, its fast-changing tidal range making it dangerous to fall into and survive.
Lee was interviewed recently by Dominic King on BBC RADIO KENT https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002ghkz and explains how rivers have always been there in his life – canoeing on the Medway, for example, and how the rivers that flow through our towns and cities form us as we form them. The ecological factor is also present: whilst Taggart Rose is one of the founding members of Poets for the Planet, Fiona Spirals raised money recently for curlews, to be found in the mudflats on the Thames estuary. Lee and Domnic also mentioned how storytelling and narratives are naturally forged and told on and alongside the water. I recently saw Lee’s film One Day, which is a beautiful abstracted almost allegorical account of a friendship, as told beside a river, where his use of the voice, and tone are deceptively powerful and moving. There is so much to write on the subject, and I am so pleased that Lee has brought the idea to fruition.
Co-presented by POW! and Hypermedia, tomorrow’s event at Gravesend literally washes up where the Thames meets the North Sea, alongside the docks, industry and ancient maritime history. Each of the evenings by TRHNC are somehow a sort of commemoration of the life (light and dark) that rivers give us, and how we give it back, in words, in verse, in film.
Exploring the richness of rivers alongside Lee will be Jessica Taggart Rose (poet living in Margate ‘concerned with humanity and nature and how they interact’); Benjamin Goode (London-based spoken word poet); Kristijan Radakovic (artist based in Berlin); Anthony Hart (Gravesend poet known for darkly comedic layered work (Poetic Flaws/Floors); Colin B Osborn (poet and musician from South London) and Fiona Spirals ( photographer, collager, poet and lover of wildlife in the Thames estuary). I won’t be able to make it but Nocturne for a Lighterman will be screened.
At the next edition of The River has no Colour (28th August) in collaboration with Insurgent Press, and at The Verbal Discharge Bookshop, Harringay, Lee will be reading my poem from the film (there won’t be a screening). I am looking forward to that as he gives a really controlled sense of drama to his voice, and it will suit the portentous, sombre, neo-symbolist mood. He is also the first person to read it!
Here is a taster to wet your appetites for tomorrow.
Fiona Spirals
@theriverhasnocolour @hypermediaevents @powplayonwords @leejjcampbell @jessicataggartrose @lmbgoode
@nouvelorganon @poeticflawsfloors @colin_b_osborn
Hypermedia, Iron Pier Brewery & Taproom, St Andrews Art Centre, Royal Pier Road, Gravesend DA12 2BD, 6pm-late. FREE ENTRY.
PLEASE NOTE: Google Maps lists Iron Pier Brewery as being on a Gravesend industrial estate. We are in the riverside location. If using Google Maps search for ‘St Andrews Art Centre’
https://filmfreeway.com/LeeCampbell
