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QUEERS READ THIS: THE RETURN
Institute of Contemporary Arts
Courtesy of Richard Porter

‘How can I tell you. How can I convince you, brother, sister that your life is in danger: That every day you wake up alive, relatively happy, and a functioning human being, you are committing a rebellious act.’

An evening of readings and performances by Lisa Fannen, Verity Spott, Golnoosh Nour and Carl Gent presented by Richard Porter. This latest instalment of Queers Read This focuses on the medium of poetry and writing as a form of resistance. 

Themes range from social justice and fault lines (Fannen), manifestos and hexes (Spott), identity and desire (Nour) and ancient queens of Mercia (Gent)

The event celebrates the ongoing work of innovative LGBTQI+, POC and working-class writers.

Queers Read This is an ongoing ICA reading series co-founded by Richard Porter and Isabel Waidner. The events feature various texts which work across intersectional systems of oppression and challenge formal distinctions between prose and poetry or critical and creative writing. The title of the series is gratefully borrowed from an anonymously published leaflet distributed at a 1990 pride march in New York City.

Part of the ICA 75th Anniversary Season
Artist Bios
Lisa Fannen has been writing and sharing words both solo and with musicians / sound makers. She published a poetry collection Faultline in 2018 and released it as a collaborative recording project in 2020. Lisa is also a bodyworker and concerned with dialogue and information exchange about health and healing as part of movement for social justice.

Verity Spott is the author of the books Gideon, Click Away Close Door Say, We Will Bury You, The Mutiny Aboard the RV Felicity, Prayers – Manifestos – Bravery, Poems of Sappho (in translation), Coronelles Set 1 and 70 Sonnets. Verity's poems have been translated into French, German and Greek. Alongside their work as chief Weasel at EDF Energy, Verity plays cello in the improvised tune duo Benzo Fury and the free jazz trio In Threads. With Kat Addis Verity co runs the poetic segment of Hollingdean Wednesdays and teaches poetry with the Creative Writing Programme. They're also a proud care worker, co-chair of Brighton and Hove Militant Liberal Democrats and a cadre of the glorious Lewes Maoists.

Golnoosh Nour is a poet, writer and academic. In 2019, she earned a PhD in Literature and Creative Writing from Birkbeck, University of London. Golnoosh’s debut short story collection The Ministry of Guidance and other stories (2020) was shortlisted for the Polari Prize 2021. Golnoosh’s poetry collection Rocksong was published in 2021 to critical acclaim, and her poetry pamphlet Impure Thoughts will be published in November 2022. She has performed in literature festivals and events across the UK and internationally. Her work has also been published by Granta, Vintage, and Columbia Journal. Golnoosh currently teaches Creative Writing at the University of Reading.

Carl Gent is an artist from Bexhill-on-sea. Recent work has sought to refictionalise the life of Cynethryth, eighth-century Queen of Mercia through a range of amateur dramatics, tabletop gaming on self-publishing cesspits and the parading of decapitated kings in community carnivals. Through their collaboration with Kelechi Anucha they made new recordings of English folk songs embedded in sculptures that investigated the girly and divine links between folk and church song. Their ongoing collaborative work with Linda Stupart has given birth to a range of live, published and exhibited projects that restaged 1990s video game Ecco the Dolphin as an artist’s play, originally commissioned by the ICA in 2019. This year they have exhibited at Goldsmiths CCA and Flatland Projects in Bexhill-on-sea and published with Arcadia Missa, Kelder Press, HOAX and Monitor Books.

D Mortimer is a writer from London focused on trans and crip narratives. Their essays and poetry have been published by Granta, ADI, and their work has been performed at the ICA. Their debut collection LAST NIGHT A BEEF JERK SAVED MY LIFE was published by Pilot Press: London in May 2021. They are a current Techne scholar at The University of Roehampton working on trans autofictions.

Richard Porter is a multidisciplinary artist. He started the imprint Pilot Press in 2017 to publish the work of his friends, later extending it to share the work of other artists and writers. The press takes its name from the Pilot Inn in Dungeness, England where the artist Derek Jarman would take his friends and collaborators after a day’s work together. Titles from the press are stocked internationally and are held in several special collections for printed matter. Since completing a course at art school in his 30s his work has been exhibited in several locations. Most notable in the past year were in group shows at John Hansard Gallery and The Modern Institute. His first solo show, Night Glyph, took place in Spring 2021 at Amanda Wilkinson Gallery. In 2023 he will publish collections by the poets John Wieners and Timothy Thornton.
 
Tickets from £7.50

Running time: 2 hours (with 15 min. break)

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