Monday, August 8, 2022

Owl Noise Zero by Owl Brain Atlas aka J.D. Nelson is available now at Bandcamp!

Out now from Post-Asemic Press! A re-release of pure intensity in the form of sound poetic brilliance. The album is titled Owl Noise Zero by Owl Brain Atlas, the sound art project of poet J.D.Nelson. It was originally self released back in 2013, but has now found a home at PAP's Bandcamp site.  J.D. is also going to release his debut collection of poems in ghostly onehead next month (September 2022) via PAP. So keep a lookout for his new poetry collection that keeps the beat spirit alive and evolving into the 21st Century.

Click here to listen to the whole album.

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Sunday, July 10, 2022

A Review of Tim Gaze's Book Glyphs of Uncertain Meaning by Rodica Frentiu

 Here's a selection from Rodica's review for PAP.


"These glyph compositions seem to settle into a puzzle that tries to reconstruct an original moment in the history of writing…Reminiscent of an artistic subconscious, Tim Gaze’s glyphs recover the process through which the direct observation of the real world enters a process of abstraction which plays a decisive role both in visualisation and in the verbalisation of thought…Tim Gaze’s glyph compositions illustrate two universes, which I would call the universe of black on white and the universe of white on black."
—Rodica FRENȚIU

From a review of Glyphs of Uncertain Meaning published in:
Philobiblon: Transylvanian Journal of Multidisciplinary Research in Humanities
Vol. XXVII (2022), nr. 1






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Friday, July 8, 2022

Possible Gardens by Jaap Blonk is available now!

 

Possible Gardens by Jaap Blonk is available now from Post-Asemic Press at Amazon!

Jaap Blonk (born 1953 in the Netherlands) first became known worldwide for his performances of sound poetry. He has performed and taught on all continents. From his sound poetry scores he gradually developed an independent body of visual work. This new product of his abundant fantasy is a book of colourful and playful drawings, adding new dimensions to
writing. Myriads of little beings populate each page. As in the artist's 2019 book "111 Recipes" they are distant descendants of Blonk's earlier phonetic signs. From the introduction by Canadian writer, artist and scholar Derek Beaulieu: "Each possible garden is a harvest of sound and image, of script and performance, which asks the reader to be open to a new menu." One element here is the depiction of a struggle between restriction and freedom as a reminder of the recent lockdown periods: in each drawing some of the tiny beings are boxed, while many others roam freely. Sometimes the images look like scientific illustrations from an unknown world, depicting mysterious interactions and behaviors. But always there is poetry in these protozoa as they squirm and swim though a microscopic linguistic field, ebbing and flowing, gathering and fracturing – a constant dance of interplay and restriction. This edition fits the history of Post-Asemic Press beautifully, as a publisher of novel ways of writing. Asemic: no semantic meaning in the word sense, abstract, but with a lively and abundant musical expression. Small wonder with Jaap Blonk's background as a world-renowned sound artist. 

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Post-Asemic Press (July 1, 2022)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 90 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1734866284
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1734866285
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 6.7 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 0.22 x 9 inches
  • Price : $20.00

"These asemic poems move fluently between language, design and illustration, creating informational graphics where the information remains unknown, inviting diverse interpretations. The suggestion that these are scientific illustrations from an unknown world depicting mysterious interactions and behaviors—animal, vegetable, chemical—does little to make their uncomfortable strangeness more familiar. If anything, the sense these are poetic explanations of processes and activities brings their alienation more fully into consciousness."
—Michael Betancourt, author of Typo Poem

"Stare gently at each possible garden Jaap Blonk has sown here until it begins to vibrate, layer by layer, lifting off the page, two dimensions shifting into three then four. Keep staring and the gardens and landscapes and maps will move and grow and glow into and through and with your eyes. Continue to stare and they will become your eyes and then your ears. To reap the tactile possibilities Blonk has generously cultivated, stare longer, and listen closely (listen as if you are the soil), page after page. When and if you are ready to eat, gently shake the pages onto the tip of your tongue (no seasoning or dressing needed). Enjoy the harvest!"
—Crag Hill, editor The Last Vispo Anthology

Links to purchase Possible Gardens:
Sample Pages:







Jaap Blonk (born 1953 in Woerden, Netherlands) is a self-taught composer, performer, poet and visual artist. His unfinished studies in mathematics and musicology mainly created a penchant for activities in a Dada vein, as did several unsuccessful jobs in offices and other well-organized systems. In the late 1970s he discovered his potential as a vocal performer, at first in reciting historical sound poetry and later on in improvisations and his own compositions. As a vocalist, Jaap Blonk is unique for his powerful stage presence and extended vocal abilities. He has performed and taught around the world, on all continents. 

Blonk’s recorded / published output comprises some 60 titles: CDs, vinyl, books and cassettes. 

From his sound poetry scores he developed an independent body of visual work, which has been exhibited in various countries. Selections have been collected in books by publishers in Germany, Ireland, Canada and the United States.




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Wednesday, June 8, 2022

Exciting News! Post-Asemic Press is listed at Poets & Writers Magazine

 https://www.pw.org/small_presses/postasemic_press

PAP is now officially listed at Poets & Writers Magazine!



Here is my author listing at Poets & Writers: 

https://www.pw.org/directory/writers/michael_jacobson

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Tuesday, May 10, 2022

Shanty Town by Grzegorz Wróblewski is available now at Amazon!

 

Shanty Town by Grzegorz Wróblewski is available now at Amazon. Click here to purchase the book.

The book also has an introduction written by the Australian poet and publisher of Otoliths Mark Young.

Shanty Town is an asemic work that demonstrates how ordinary handwriting can be elevated into a fine art. The writing dashes with expressive speed and invention, and plays with legibility in a mode of gestural decisiveness. The book is a document of abstract energy and poetic brilliance, and when opened the book presents the reader with a new contrasting spirit to digital art, and re-engages with the real world in a way that speaks across time. The hectic calligraphy works with an urgency and proclaims a new mode of rough writing in the extreme.


Blurbs:

"Rough, unkept, spontaneous and free, Grzegorz Wróblewski's Shanty Town depicts a blurry world of post-literate indecipherability. With coarsely drawn shapes imposed upon a chaos of asemic writing, this collection is built from the rubble of uncomfortable truths.  A triumph of bold writing."              

 

— Dave Read


"Shanty Town packs a powerful punch. It stakes you straight through the heart and throws you overboard, only to next moment toss you a life buoy. It's Grzegorz Wróblewski's opus magnum, in which he brought together the heart and the mind on a whole new level. I see a world that worries him but nonetheless he manages to draw pure beauty from it. Somewhere in between, a fragile hope for salvation emerges. His own and ours." 

—  Karina Obara

"Manic notes from the underbelly. Scores scored out and scorching. Fenced off communities of frozen language. Prisons, pens and penal markings. Lines are blocked off, squashed into huddles and forever ringed or scarred. Sometimes a shape emerges shaken, tries to connect, map and communicate the inner terrain; but there's pain and great beauty here we can barely contemplate. Grzegorz Wróblewski's writings express the world village in trauma. There's nothing left to say, and this is the only way of saying it."       

— Stephen Nelson

"The asemic projects of Grzegorz Wróblewski are a testimony to the skills of the human hand, used to convey meaning over millennia of evolution. In the infinite repetition of shapes, lines and colors, the hand reaches a state of maximum sensitivity that allows it to detect the epiphanic proto-signals of the micro- and macroworld."                 

—Anna Matysiak

"Shanty Town is an unusual work, full of compositions unlike anything else I've seen. The pages appear to have been made in 2 stages, drawn annotations over handwritten or hand-drawn ideas underneath. The first stage ranges from well-behaved written lines as in a letter, to jerky scribbled fragmentary jottings, to sketchy doodles, young ideas captured at high speed. The second stage uses shapes such as rectangles, circles and lines, which appear to be organizing or explaining the first stage they partly cover. Although rectangles and rectangular frames are widely used, these works are at the loosest end of rectilinearity. Wróblewski uses visual rhetoric in a poetic way."

—Tim Gaze, author of Glyphs of Uncertain Meaning, publisher of Asemic magazine


Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Post-Asemic Press (May 4, 2022)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 63 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1734866276
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1734866278
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 5.3 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 0.15 x 9 inches
  • Price : $12.00

Here are some links to purchase Shanty Town:

Here are some sample pages from Shanty Town:

 




Grzegorz' Bio:




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Monday, April 11, 2022

id est: neo scribalist asemic expressionism by Michael Jacobson


Here are sample pages from my work in progress id est: neo scribalist asemic expressionism.

The book is scheduled to be released on my 50th birthday in 2023 by Post-Asemic Press. id est is an abstract illuminated manuscript that will be 73 pages in length and reflect the universe as I have experienced it. I am posting all the pages on my Facebook wall as I complete painting them. I am using gouache and watercolor pencils to hand-paint the pages one at a time. So far I am up to page 42. The book will be a hardcover and will be available in a print-on-demand edition. 

Manuscripts that influenced me are The Book of Kells, The Voynich Manuscript, The Codex Seraphinianus, and the painted books from Mexico. Though my book is influenced by the totality of human expression going all the way back to cave art and forward to asemic calligraphy, graffiti, neo expressionism, and alien scripts in science fiction. Kenneth Patchen's painted poems are another source of inspiration for me. William Blake's Illuminated Manuscripts are a major influence on my book though more in spirit than aesthetically.









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Sunday, April 10, 2022

Michael Jacobson has 3 books out now! Check out his latest book Somnolent Game!


 

I officially have 3 paperback books out! My latest book Somnolent Game was released earlier this week from Post-Asemic Press. But with print on demand technology my older titles will stay in print as long as the Internet exists. So my backlist titles Hei Kuu and Works & Interviews are still available to purchase at online bookstores.  

Somnolent Game is a book about desire, the desire to leave a bad situation for something better, even if it means facing death, even if you are Death. It is a book that was influenced by stream-of-conscious writing and surrealism. It's a fast paced prose poetry novella that goes on a psychological adventure through the mind of Itallica Loghost. A character who just wants one good night of sleep.

Hei Kuu is my personal mythology and was my first collection of purely verbal senryu/haiku minimalist  poetry. I wrote the book drunk and edited it sober as Hemingway suggested. The book is rich with language even though the poems are short. It was released in 2020 and is autobiographical to the point of satire, drama, and tragedy. 

Works & Interviews is where I got my start with so many writing endeavors. It's a book that travels from asemic calligraphy to my many thoughts on asemic writing. This is a book that I am hoping will become a classic someday, and climb out of its underground status. Most of everything in the book is available for free online, but W&I collects everything together in one book, and presents it offline as a document of my existence. 

Here is my personal author blog: https://michaeljacobsonauthor.blogspot.com
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