Poetry in the Digital Age

By On · Leave a Comment · In Poetry

Poetry and creative writing has seen a decline in popularity for many years, but with the digital age now upon us, resurgence in its popularity may be coming about with websites such as www.movellas.com and www.wattpad.com becoming very popular with the creative youth.

You would probably assume that very few young people enjoy and participate in creative writing, but judging by the number of participators and readers of Movellas and Wattpad, you’d be pleasantly surprised.

Check out Wattpad and you’ll see 20,000+ teenagers writing poetry with 100,000+ reading the work and over on Movellas there are 20+ new poems uploads by young adults every day and the most popular piece has been read 15,000+ times! Very promising indeed.

Movellas

Movellas

Movellas was launched in Denmark in 2010 and had its own UK version since February 2012. All different kinds of creative writing are encouraged here, not just poetry, including- fan fiction, fantasy, romance, journalism, adventure and more.

They are currently running a competition to unearth new, young talent with their Young Movellist of the Year, the top prize is a publishing contract with Random House, £2000 and a Sony Reader. Runners up prizes include Malorie Blackman’s entire teen backlist, a Sony Reader, afternoon tea with Malorie Blackman and a mentoring session with a professional writer.

To enter, all you have to do is log in, or create an account, and upload the first 3 chapters of your story for feedback and advice from other readers. Once you have received and considered your pieces’ feedback you may decide to make some changes, once you are happy with your work then you need to email your FULL novel (40,000+) to movellist@movellas.com to be in with a change of winning.

Wattpad

wattpad

Wattpad was launched in 2006 in Canada and is now the self-described “best place to discover and share stories” much like a YouTube for readers/ writers. As well as poetry, users can write stories on a place them in the various genres e.g. romance, teen fiction, action, paranormal, humour and more.

Wattpad runs a few competitions each year; one called the Watty Awards which are for novelists and another for poetry writers called The Attys, which was launched only last year!

The Attys, named after the Canadian novelist and poet Margaret Adwood, asks for entrants to submit either a single poem or a collection of 10 poems, with each one demonstrating a different poetic form, depending on their level of poem writing.

The prizes on offer included $1000, feedback on the writers work from Margaret Adwood, a Google Nexus tablet, signed certificates from Margaret Adwood and more.

Salvador Dali Exhibition in Paris

By On · Leave a Comment · In Art, Painting, Surrealism

Dali died over 20 years ago but his bizarre/ surreal/ striking/ much loved artwork is available for all to see in Paris, at the Pompidou Centre, running from 21 November- 25th March 2013. If you can’t make it to Paris in time, the exhibition is being moved to Madrid, so hopefully you’ll be able to catch it there from 24th April 2013 onwards.

It’s hoped that it will become the Pompidou’s most visited exhibition of all time, which will beat the current holder of that title- Salvador Dali! In 1979 Dali presided over his exhibition which saw just fewer than 900,000 people come and visit, that’s approximately 8,000 a day!

This is the largest collection and showing of Dali’s work in over 30 years and includes his oil paintings, sculptures, films and installations. Overall, over 200 pieces of work, spanning decades of his life, will be available for all art lovers to view.

The collection has been created from smaller collections from some of the world’s most famous galleries, including; the Museum of Modern Art, the Tate Modern, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and also from three museums Dali’s work is entrusted with; the Museo Reina Sofia, the Salvador Dali Museum and  the Figueres Gala Salvador Dali Foundation.

Salvador Dali Fun Facts

Did you know-

  1. Salvador was named after his dead brother.
    9 months before Dali was born his brother died of gastroenteritis and on his fifth birthday he was taken to his brother’s grave and told about him. Regarding his brother, Dali said he “was probably a first version of myself but conceived too much in the absolute”
  2. He fancied Hitler.
    Dali was obsessed with Hitler and had some rather strange homoerotic thoughts about him; he was quoted saying “I often dream of Hitler as a woman” and that Hitler turned him on the most.
  3. He could paint his dreams.
    Dali was fascinated by the images that he dreamed of just as he was falling asleep, but he was unable to remember them after he had fully slept. So he set up an imaginative way to wake himself just after he drifted off to sleep. Dali would place a large pan next to his chair and hold a spoon is his hand, which he dangled over the arm of the chair. As he drifted off to sleep and images filled his mind, he would drop the spoon into the pan and wake himself up from a noise it made. His description for these paintings- “hand painted dream photographs.”

Old Spainish Lady Ruins 200 Year Old Painting of Jesus Christ

By On · Leave a Comment · In News, Painting

An old lady in Spain has, with good intentions, completely ruined a 200 year old painting of Jesus Christ.

The painting has now been described as looking like “an ape wearing a poncho”.

Cecilia Gimenez snuck into her local church of Santuario de Misericordia and tried to restore the painting, unfortunately she was trying to do it in the dark. When she realised the amateur restoration project had gotten out of hand, it was too late and she had to confess to what she had done.

Gimenez will meet with professional restoration experts to see if the painting can be salvaged, she has been asked to attend so that the professionals can understand what materials she used and how she went about her botched restoration.

It was first believed, by church authorities, that the painting had been deliberately vandalised. Gimenez then stepped forward to admit her crime, which locals are now calling for a full investigation into how this could happen.

Below is a video of Cecilia Gimenez explaining that she was infact asked by the priest to perform the restoration… I’m not so sure about her story, but watch and decide for yourself -