Found Poetry Example

For my first example of Found Poetry I want to start with comparing it symbolically to certain types of visual art/visual art movements. Doing this has always helped me fathom the idea of found poetry (probably due to my art/art history education). There are many different types of found poetry as I defined in my previous post, however, I feel that talking about it through the lens of Dadaism relates most to the type of found poetry I want to create. In class we created a Dadaist poem, which involved using a chance factor to "remix" text found within a newspaper.  I think the idea of "contextual confusion" here is what interests me. Dadaism promotes ideas of using the "readymade" as a philosophy for creating work. By doing this, these artists are sourcing the found material and taking it out of context for the sake of creating art.

Marcel Duchamp is a name I'd like to mention for the purpose of this example post. His fame came from turning the tables of art through taking readymade materials and placing them into the context of art. His piece "Fountain" is probably the most well known example of this idea. This piece has been considered the most influential piece of modern art work. Taking a readymade manufactured urinal, signing it "R.Mutt 1917", and placing it on a pedestal is what Duchamp did to create this piece. These simple gestures sparked much conversation revolving around the question of "what defines art as art?".

Lets look at this piece through the context of found poetry and how it relates. Found poetry takes readymade material and places it out of context from its original source, much like what Duchamp is doing here with "Fountain". Additionally, he is adding a small portion of his own text/input, "R.Mutt 1917". This is also a characteristic of some found poetry. His addition of this small handwritten gesture, in my opinion, further uplifts the readymade aspect of the urinal through juxtaposition. Ideally, that is what I would like to do with my use of found poetry (through mixing it with memoir).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fountain_(Duchamp)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry#Examples
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4059997.stm