We Who Are About To Die : Chris Turnbull

Chris Turnbull lives near Ottawa, Ontario. Recent books include continua (Chaudiere Books, 2015) and [ untitled ] in o w n (CUE Books, 2015), alongside work by Heather Hermant and angela rawlings, respectively. Recent work has appeared in Spiral Orb 11 and Brick Books' A Celebration of Visual/Concrete Poetry Part II (ed. Amanda Earl). She is currently collaborating with Portuguese artist and poet bruno neiva on a multi-form poetic series and working on site specific installations, or pieces, with Fieldworks and CSArt Ottawa. She plants poems on trails via her footpress, rout/e.
 

Where are you now?

 

At home.

 

What are you reading?

 

Invisible Cities (Darran Anderson); Stories (Anton Chekhov), Beyond Geometry: Experiments in Form (ed. Lynn Zelevansky); Lost Language (Maxine Gadd), a couple of archaeological magazines. Some land-based essays & bits and pieces.

 

What have you discovered lately?

 

The dryer harbours socks. New trails, unmapped. A metal historical signpost marking the location of an absent church on a walk (that I've done multiple times) to Oxford Mills. Funny what happens when your gaze shifts just a bit.

 

Where do you write?

 

In my head in my notebook from outside

 

What are you working on?

 

a series of series; a collaboration with bruno neiva; a continuation of my dusie 8 chapbook; a rock-centric installation; a riverine installation that returns me to cubes; a contribution to CSArt Ottawa. My ongoing footpress, rout/e; a video for continua (Chaudiere 2015) incorporating the voices of multiple folks and land-based film. That latter is going to be a slow, and fumbly, project. Most of these are collaborative in some way.
 

Have you anything forthcoming?

 

I have a couple of pieces coming out in Canada & Beyond and ColdFront and a tribute piece to poet/activist Jamie Reid in Cap Review's ti-TCR-13. The installations will be at Fieldwork and 4 Elements. I have a collaboration with ceramicist Susie Osler with CSArt Ottawa, and another with a local conservation area (potentially) in relation to posting and launching (with a walk) a rendition of rout/e. CSArt Ottawa is a neat venture modelled after the agricultural CSA whereby individuals are invited to subscribe to receive art works or attend events over the course of a season. In part, its design focuses on the reciprocity between artists and engaged communities.

 

What would you rather be doing?

 

I try to focus on perspective - most of the time I am doing what I like to be doing, when I'm not, I find something in it that I can enjoy. Sometimes even doing a thing I like to do can have irritations to it but I know I'll work through those to the integral elements of whatever it is that makes it integral.

 

Can you include, also, a recent poem or two, as well as a bio and photo? The poems don’t need to be unpublished, and we could cite book or chapbook (if that is what you send), as long as you have permission to reprint.

 

 Yes - see attached "sweeps predicate a)" [unpublished] and can you use this link to [untitled]: https://vimeo.com/127159710? Can cite that [untitled] is part of o w n with a rawlings and Heather Hermant, respectively. CUE Books 2014.

 

Thanks, Ian.