The third issue of the Virtual Poetry Project is out: Achronos, by Ernesto Estrella and Nysos Vasilopoulos.

See the new issue here.

Achronos is a combination of image, sound and text, which is presented taking advantage of the new features that html 5 offers.  The poems are performed by the author himself, recorded and uploaded to the New Media Lab server in vorbis audio format (ogg).  The site then will be supported, as is stated in the homepage, by open source browsers, such as Firefox and Google Chrome, or otherwise by a browser that has included support for html 5 and the ogg container, such as the newest version of Opera.  The idea is to keep the use of html 5 to its simplest expression, in order to showcase its possibilities for multimedia presentation online.  In the first issue of the Virtual Poetry Project, the use of the video tag was showcased side by side with an embedded flash player.  In this new issue, no flash alternative is provided, in order to demonstrate that proprietary technologies are not longer needed for media editing, encoding and publishing.

About the authors:

Ernesto Estrella Cózar is an educator/poet/performer living in New York since 2000 and teaching as Hispanic Poetry assistant professor at Yale University since 2007. He obtained his Ph. D. at Columbia University’s department of Spanish and Portuguese.

As a scholar, he has published critical articles in prestigious international journals, such as the Hispanic Review and the Revista Hispánica Moderna, and his poetic theory volume “Espacio”, poema en prosa de Juan Ramón Jiménez. Centro de una metamorfosis poética went to press in the summer of 2010. In addition, Ernesto regularly teaches workshops that interweave philosophy, politics, arts and ethics. His current workshop, Reading the Poem as Present will be held during January-February 2011 at the Bowery Poetry Club. Aimed at the performative dimension of the poem as sound art, this workshop will be sponsored by the Spanish Consulate in New York as part of their 2011 Cultural program.

As a poet, Ernesto was been included in anthologies such as Inmenso Estrecho (2007) and Cuadernos del abismo. (2008). His poetry books Boca de prosas (Mouth of Proses) and Achronos will soon appear in press. He is also currently working on a two-volume poetic novel entitled Escuela de tu nombre (School of your Name).

As a performer, his current poetry show, Out of the word, into the sound, uses the voice to investigate the poetic text’s potential beyond its content, as well as the extension of poetic thought through sound. The show presents poems from the Hispanic tradition, the multimedia work “Achronos” (Ernesto Estrella/ Nysos Vasilopoulos), and pure sound pieces. Out of the word, into the sound was partially premiered at the Bowery Poetry Club in NYC, and was performed in the summer of 2010 in Berlin (Wortwedding: Gallery Space for Poetry), Kaliningrad (Slowwwo Poetry Festival), and St. Petersburg (Kitaisky Letchik Club). It will also be presented in NYC at The Tank in December of this current year. At the moment, Ernesto is also working on his next performance, entitled, Opening the Poem, which will include texts in Spanish, English, Greek and Russian. As a result of his collaboration with the Greek musician Stelios Michas, a project entitled Sinfonía Oblicua (Homage to the Uruguayan poet Julio Herrera y Reissig) has been born. The aim of this work, which sets voice and guitar in a compositional/improvisational dynamic, was premiered in Montevideo at the “Veladas Beatnick” in November 2010 and will be performed at the Le Poisson Rouge in NYC in February 2011.

Regarding his activity as a musician, he has been writing and performing music with his experimental rock band, Hellhoundsound, for which he serves as leader and lyricist. The band performs regularly in New York music venues. www.myspace.com/hellhoundsound

Nyssos Vasilopoulos was born in Greece in 1976. He studied Journalism, Photography and History of European Civilization in Athens. Additionally he studied Film Direction in Berlin in KASKELINE FILMACADEMIE. For the last 6 years he has been a permanent resident of Berlin. He takes black and white pictures on the road in Berlin with the aim of publishing a photobook about Berlin. He is pursuing his postgraduate studies in Management & Administration of Cultural Stations, and is the lighting designer of the international dance team ADLIDANCE. His main purpose is to elevate the functions of the human being through light.  Visit:  http://www.nyssosv.com/

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