Asemic poetry is made from marks without meaning, often marks that resemble writing of some kind. Meaning comes from the marks themselves and their place in the overall composition.
For a long time, I have been intrigued by how lines can be drawn to cross a page, and the various metaphorical meanings that they suggest. On each of the pages / stanzas, five lines start at the top and work their way downwards, interacting as they go, reflecting how ideas, sounds or images might be entwined in a poem. They are laid out vertically as if a transcription of spoken poetry. The underlying painting reminds us that poetry connects with us as the people we are, of our time and place.
The title references Scottish artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham and US poet William Carlos Williams, who made works entitled 12 Lines and Lines.
I tried two different paintings as the base layer for this asemic poem. In the one above (one of a series of four panels painted during lockdown), there is an echoing of the intertwining line on a different scale. The painting used below is more dramatic and hints at something like a spoken performance of an asemic poem.
5 Accompanied Lines and Scarlet, Lynne Cameron, 2020
pen on paper, laid on acrylic on paper