Turn on Literature

3 Libraries in Romania, Norway and Denmark have joined forces to “turn on literature” by creating 3 generative literature machines (poetry machines) and 3 authors have written texts for the machines. The poetry machine is designed to involve users in the creation of e-lit in the library space. Through a game-like interface the user combines the author’s sentences into a poem, which will then be printed onto a library receipt creating an intermedial translation. At the same time, the poem will be projected onto projection surfaces in the other participating libraries making the installation transnational. The poetry machine translates the concept of e-literature into a tangible object (a printed poem) and transforms the solitary activities of writing and reading into a social undertaking since three simultaneous users can interact with the machine creating a poem together. Our installation is located within the “Translations” strand of the festival. The festival in Porto will be the very first showing of the installation, which is an up-scaled re-design and re-writing of the Ink installation presented at the ELO conference in Milwaukee in 2014. For the festival, we will exhibit one poetry machine. The works are in 3 different languages, but will be translated into English for the festival. Through live projections, poems created in the participating libraries will cross borders as they are shown at the festival in Porto as well. The project is co-funded by the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union. The installation consists of: text from Danish poet Ursula Andkjaer Olsen, Norwegian poet Morten Langeland, and Romanian poet Radu Vancu; a piece of furniture (1,60 x 1,20 meters) with a large flatscreen + 3 podiums with interaction controllers in the form of books. Required space for the installation: Preferably 3 x 4 meters (if possible) Technical needs: internet connection (preferably wireless) projector + projection surface. 

(Source: ELO 2017: Book of Abstracts and Catalogs)