Tag Archives: poems

#SpinePoetry for National Poetry Month: Part I

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In celebration of National Poetry Month, we asked Phillips staff to venture to The Phillips Collection Library and (literally) compile books into stacks—turning the titles into cohesive poems. Marketing and Communications Intern Joelle Levinas kicked us off with this series of spine poems relating to the museum.

joelle-levinas_art in our time

Photo: Joelle Levinas

 

Art In Our Time
The Expanded Eye
Invisible Colors
Parallel Visions
Fast Forward
Art of Our Time

 

 

 

 

 

joelle-levinas_what is art

Photo: Joelle Levinas

 

What Is Art?
Places of Delight
Color and Meaning
Forms of Passion
Making Choices
Feeding Desire
Making Paradise
Fixing the World

 

 

 

 

joelle-levinas_collections

Photo: Joelle Levinas

 

Museum Collection(s)
Landscape with Figure
Modernism
Action/Abstraction
Portraits
Color and Culture
Impressionism
The Phillips Collection

 

 

 

 

Check back for more poems this month! Compile your own and share them on Twitter and Instagram with #spinepoetry.

A Collective Poem for a Painting

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On Friday, Meagan Estep, graduate intern in Education, led a large group of visitors on a special edition of our daily Spotlight tours. This Personal Response tour had the group enthusiastically exchanging observations and ideas in a series of activities focused on a few permanent collection favorites. In one activity, we split into groups, each writing a sentence about a selected painting and then combining our sentences to form a poem about the work. Here are two of our creations:

 

Marc Chagall’s The Dream

Marc Chagall, The Dream, 1939. Gouache on paper, 20 9/16 x 26 3/4 in. The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. Acquired 1942.

Marc Chagall, The Dream, 1939. Gouache on paper, 20 9/16 x 26 3/4 in. The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. Acquired 1942.

 

A dark night of the Russian soul
Love in poverty
Tenderness amidst uncertainty
A feathery softness
Brings light to the darkness

 

 

 

 

 

Vincent van Gogh’s Entrance to the Public Gardens in Arles

Vincent van Gogh, Entrance to the Public Gardens in Arles, 1888. Oil on canvas, 28 1/2 x 35 3/4 in. The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. Acquired 1930.

Vincent van Gogh, Entrance to the Public Gardens in Arles, 1888. Oil on canvas, 28 1/2 x 35 3/4 in. The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. Acquired 1930.

 

I reach inward and consider my thoughts
To and fro
To and fro
Green and gold surround me
In a warm place
Sculpted Sky
Blue feelings rise up
Days go by, life unfolds