poetry

Memøry Høuse Art Project

What I mostly remember about the past is a sum of absent encounters, people and things missing; summers, winters, in fact, years melted into a reservoir of images and experiences that are working their way slowly into my future. What I refuse to remember travels along as an indispensable companion to my imagination and my creativity. Understanding this companionship has been one reason for extending my PhD research on the Romanian diaspora in the United Kingdom and collective memory, to build Memøry Høuse. As an art collaboration, Memøry Høuse is searching for a point (or many points) of integrating social memories. Someone recently made me wonder whether this project is a constellation of remembering opportunities. It might possibly be true as not all memories make sense in words. Some are barely perceived in my body, in colour, in sound; or in places and in people. To some extent, my awareness of their existence often frees me from my own enslavement and, as a researcher and writer in this context, the enslavement of the generation I belong to: The Romanian Children of the Decree.

As the Memøry Høuse project evolves, my hope is that these memories will find a place of acknowledgment and, instead of travelling wildly, will begin to settle, find a home, or build their own house on a land that was once foreign but so familiar now.

My gratitude and so many thanks to the artists involved in this collaboration: Mark Mawer and Andrew Morrison.

Memory House Project
Memory House Project
Memory House Project
Memory House Project

More updates will follow as the work continues. The exhibition Memøry Høuse will take place in February 2024 at the Lansdown Art Gallery, Stroud.

© Maria Stadnicka, September 2023

Viewfinder

Artwork © Rupert Loydell, 2023
At moments of high peak
dreams show errors 
in our genetic code:
arrows on the skin’s map
erasures concealed by grammar.
We practise the waltz steps
between dots strewn on marble.

In our lives’ antechambers
the cameras record us blushing,
holding hands, sharpening knives.
Like in any rehearsal, the blades fall
on past things, on future plans.
Time decides for itself how long
the echo, how short the call.

There are no corrections. 


© Maria Stadnicka and Andrew Morrison, 2023.
Poem published in International Times on 30/09/2023.

Memøry Høuse Art Project

What I mostly remember about the past is a sum of absent encounters, people and things missing; summers, winters, in fact, years melted into a reservoir of images and experiences that are working their way slowly into my future. What I refuse to remember travels along as an indispensable companion to my imagination and my creativity. Understanding this companionship has been one reason for extending my PhD research on the Romanian diaspora in the United Kingdom and collective memory, to build Memøry Høuse. As an art collaboration, Memøry Høuse is searching for a point (or many points) of integrating social memories. Someone recently made me wonder whether this project is a constellation of remembering opportunities. It might possibly be true as not all memories make sense in words. Some are barely perceived in my body, in colour, in sound; or in places and in people. To some extent, my awareness of their existence often frees me from my own enslavement and, as a researcher and writer in this context, the enslavement of the generation I belong to: The Romanian Children of the Decree.

As the Memøry Høuse project evolves, my hope is that these memories will find a place of acknowledgment and, instead of travelling wildly, will begin to settle, find a home, or build their own house on a land that was once foreign but so familiar now.

My gratitude and so many thanks to the artists involved in this collaboration: Amanda Bonney Lowery, Mark Mawer and Andrew Morrison.

© Andrew Morrison Books, 2023
© Mark Mawer and Andrew Morrison, 2023

More updates will follow as the work continues. The exhibition Memøry Høuse will take place in February 2024.

© Maria Stadnicka, September 2023

Memøry Høuse Art Project

What I mostly remember about the past is a sum of absent encounters, people and things missing; summers, winters, in fact, years melted into a reservoir of images and experiences that are working their way slowly into my future. What I refuse to remember travels along as an indispensable companion to my imagination and my creativity. Understanding this companionship has been one reason for extending my PhD research on the Romanian diaspora in the United Kingdom and collective memory, to build Memøry Høuse. As an art collaboration, Memøry Høuse is searching for a point (or many points) of integrating social memories. Someone recently made me wonder whether this project is a constellation of remembering opportunities. It might possibly be true as not all memories make sense in words. Some are barely perceived in my body, in colour, in sound; or in places and in people. To some extent, my awareness of their existence often frees me from my own enslavement and, as a researcher and writer in this context, the enslavement of the generation I belong to: The Romanian Children of the Decree.

As the Memøry Høuse project evolves, my hope is that these memories will find a place of acknowledgment and, instead of travelling wildly, will begin to settle, find a home, or build their own house on a land that was once foreign but so familiar now.

My gratitude and so many thanks to the artists involved in this collaboration: Amanda Bonney Lowery, Mark Mawer and Andrew Morrison.

© Andrew Morrison, 2023, letter press, copyeditor, printer
© Maria Stadnicka, 2023

More updates will follow as the work continues. The exhibition Memøry Høuse will take place in February 2024.

© Maria Stadnicka, September 2023

Memøry Høuse Art Project

What I mostly remember about the past is a sum of absent encounters, people and things missing; summers, winters, in fact, years melted into a reservoir of images and experiences that are working their way slowly into my future. What I refuse to remember travels along as an indispensable companion to my imagination and my creativity. Understanding this companionship has been one reason for extending my PhD research on the Romanian diaspora in the United Kingdom and collective memory, to build Memøry Høuse. As an art collaboration, Memøry Høuse is searching for a point (or many points) of integrating social memories. Someone recently made me wonder whether this project is a constellation of remembering opportunities. It might possibly be true as not all memories make sense in words. Some are barely perceived in my body, in colour, in sound; or in places and in people. To some extent, my awareness of their existence often frees me from my own enslavement and, as a researcher and writer in this context, the enslavement of the generation I belong to: The Romanian Children of the Decree.

As the Memøry Høuse project evolves, my hope is that these memories will find a place of acknowledgment and, instead of travelling wildly, will begin to settle, find a home, or build their own house on a land that was once foreign but so familiar now.

My gratitude and so many thanks to the artists involved in this collaboration: Amanda Bonney Lowery, Mark Mawer and Andrew Morrison.

More updates will follow as the work continues. The exhibition Memøry Høuse will take place in February 2024.

© Maria Stadnicka, September 2023

Memøry Høuse Art Project

What I mostly remember about the past is a sum of absent encounters, people and things missing; summers, winters, in fact, years melted into a reservoir of images and experiences that are working their way slowly into my future. What I refuse to remember travels along as an indispensable companion to my imagination and my creativity. Understanding this companionship has been one reason for extending my PhD research on the Romanian diaspora in the United Kingdom and collective memory, to build Memøry Høuse. As an art collaboration, Memøry Høuse is searching for a point (or many points) of integrating social memories. Someone recently made me wonder whether this project is a constellation of remembering opportunities. It might possibly be true as not all memories make sense in words. Some are barely perceived in my body, in colour, in sound; or in places and in people. To some extent, my awareness of their existence often frees me from my own enslavement and, as a researcher and writer in this context, the enslavement of the generation I belong to: The Romanian Children of the Decree.

As the Memøry Høuse project evolves, my hope is that these memories will find a place of acknowledgment and, instead of travelling wildly, will begin to settle, find a home, or build their own house on a land that was once foreign but so familiar now.

My gratitude and so many thanks to the artists involved in this collaboration: Amanda Bonney Lowery, Mark Mawer and Andrew Morrison.

More updates will follow as the work continues. The exhibition Memøry Høuse will take place in February 2024.

© Maria Stadnicka, September 2023

Pathology

Photograph © Maria Stadnicka August 2023. River. Traces of Life.

Pathology

In early autumn, mornings begin

with the same letter and most things

go on so suddenly, they strike you

as brutal. You forget names and

places where both,

the self and the other, stood

counting insect bites. The ashes of

summer wakefulness, squeezed between

palms pushing against low skies.   

One is taller, one is happier.

The picture resembles

a clearing dome under which you repeat

daily dressing-undressing then

sort items according to necessities:

to set aside,

to bring together, or

in readiness for the big hibernation.

© Maria Stadnicka, 2023.

disOrder

Illustration © Nick Victor, 2023
One. Stand in a glass dolls house. Turn
the key and a musical box opens. 
Puppets in spiral – long days of grass. 

Two. Walk to the top of a hill, watch over 
those awoken by star lights. When we sing, 
we do not use words. 

Three. Hold tight on to the back of 
a minotaur; in the labyrinth we guard 
the source of our rivers. 

Four. Swimming lessons. Breathing 
practice for later life. Check 
the sea level at regular intervals. 

Five. Decide that the earliest memory is
a feeling. Someone passed it onto us
by accident. It still matters. 

Six. Find a safe place, give it a nickname
or at least get a colour to fit with
the things we tell ourselves.

Seven. Pull a curtain over the ruins of 
here. Convince ourselves: all we need 
is just round the corner. 

Eight. Travel by car, boat, bus; 
the motion sickness for changing 
our minds always at the last minute.

Nine. Count empty chairs at departure 
gates. Fold the rest of the day
in half then gift it to strangers. 

Ten. Arrivals happen when there is 
no luggage left to pick up. All forgiven 
out of necessity. 
 
Eleven. The railway platform keeps
changing numbers. Watch closely 
notice boards in an antechamber. 

Twelve. Rush out in yesterday’s clothes,
fill up the rooms in our heart
with what is to come.

© Maria Stadnicka and Andrew Morrison, MMXXIII

published in International Times on 12th August 2023. 







					

	
	



			
				



			
	
	
	
	

		

			Where
		

	


			

			






....    I tell the distance that
people’s names are 
shorter than rivers… 
threads 
on the world’s spine 
gliding
to the edge of an abyss 
where all their deeds fall
glass-clear
to no ending
except themselves.


© Maria Stadnicka MMXXIII

					

	
	



			
				



			
	
	
	
	

		

			‘Domestication’ for Printed Poetry Symposium, Centre for Print Research UWE Bristol, 14 Oct 2021
		

	


			

			





‘Domestication’ Maria Stadnicka and Andrew Morrison, October 2021





For Printed Poetry Symposium Andrew Morrison and Maria Stadnicka have documented the process of making a collaborative print – a dialogue between poet (who also draws) and letterpress artist (who also writes). The poem reaches towards appropriate visual form as letterpress variations are passed between the two. Maria and Andrew have worked together on a number of projects involving written/spoken word and visual arts; most recently Andrew’s letterpress collages made in response to Maria’s poems from Buried Gods Metal Prophets (Guillemot Press, 2021).










Printed Poetry Symposium is organised by Angie Butler for the Centre for Print Research, UWE, Bristol. and takes place on Thursday, 14th October 2021, 2pm at Arnolfini, Bristol. 





The event includes talks by: Nancy Campbell, Johanna Darque (Small Press), Antony Dunn (the People Powered Press), Leonard McDermid, Andrew Morrison, Maria Stadnicka, Ndukwe Onuoha, Pat Randle, and Barrie Tullett. Tickets are available here.










© Maria Stadnicka, October 2021.