Free your mind and stay weird: An interview with Bart de Paepe in The Odd Magazine

 

Bart de Paepe is a musician and artist living in Belgium. Since 2005 he has curated Sloow Tapes, which has released a substantial catalogue of music and poetry. Of his latest album, Zürahümnah, Forced Exposure says it  ‘is an immediate and immersive dive into solitary inner and outer worlds of light and darkness…. a mysterious journey through detached time and space.’

You have been influenced by psychedelia, and this is reflected not only in your own music and art but also in much of the music you have released under Sloow Tapes. What is the relevance of psychedelia in 2026?

Maybe now it’s more relevant as ever considering all those right-wing conservatives in power everywhere whose only interest lies in creating a control-freak environment of paranoid nationalism against civil liberties. Free your mind and stay weird, I say...
Read more.

Poem by Gary Cummiskey in The Odd Magazine 31

 

The Odd Magazine 31 also includes a poem by Gary Cummiskey titled 'Moving Mindless'. You can view it and other poems in the latest issue of The Odd Magazine here.

Interview with Ramuntcho Matta in The Odd Magazine

Ramuntcho Matta.
Photographer: Oona Matta

 

The Odd Magazine 31 is now out, and among other goodies contains an interview (in English and French) with musician and artist Ramuntcho Matta. In the interview, Ramuntcho talks about people such as his father, surrealist artist Roberto Matta; Ira Cohen and William Burroughs; but most of all about his friendship with Brion Gysin. He also chats about his music and visual art.

Oddity 28: The latest issue of The Odd Magazine is out!

Check out the latest issue of The Odd Magazine at: https://theoddmagazine.wixsite.com/oddity28

Note: Desktop viewing preferred.

Your wild ride begins here:

Odd Poetry: Claudia Wysocky, Erin Jamieson, Jay Passer, John Grey, Mathew Friday, and Sean Meggeson.

Odd Shorts:  Dominik Slusarczyk, John Fain, Kapka Nilan, Karen Schauber, Kathryn Silver-Hajo, Louella Lester, Luanne Castle, Mario Mussa, Meg Pokrass, and Mehreen Ahmed.

Odd Art: Pascal Ulrich, Howie Good, and Eric Brunet

Odd Interview: Robert Roman conversation with Gary Cummiskey (in English and French) 

Please share the news with the world through your social channels and show me some loving' at our's too!

Remember to...

Always, #StayOdd!

Yours Oddly,

Sreemanti Sengupta

Odditor, The Odd Magazine & Odd Books

Website: www.theoddmagazine.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/oddzine

X: @MagazineOdd

Paul Warren: You’re absorbing the images through mass media, so how can they not filter into your work

Paul Warren is an artist and illustrator with an interest in surrealism and abstract art. He works in a variety of different mediums, including collage. Paul's work has been published by Dumpster Fire Press, The Odd Magazine and Word Vomit Zine.  He has online galleries at Deviant Art and Instagram. He lives in Daventry, England.

You live in the town of Daventry, Northamptonshire, in England. What is the art scene like in England these days? What is the support for visual art? Is there a fair bit of regionalism?

I think the art scene in England is pretty staid these days. It only exist in most people’s lives when Banksy sprays something on a wall somewhere.  All of the big exhibitions are London-based, with a corporate sponsor. From time to time something interesting will pop up in an independent gallery away from the capital. I usually find out about these after the event. National media focus only on the big exhibitions: Monet or Hockney, for example. Living here these things easily pass you by! So yes, I think there is some regionalism. There have been attempts to revive the Art Lab idea in some areas, including Northampton. There are people creating art locally but few opportunities.

Thankfully I have a day job. I would never make a living out of art, wouldn’t want to, it’s far too precarious. I also have the freedom to produce what I want. Read more.

Interview with British artist Paul Warren in The Odd Magazine (Oddity 25)

 

Paul Warren is an artist and illustrator with an interest in surrealism and abstract art. He works in a variety of different mediums, including collage. Paul's work has been published by Dumpster Fire Press, The Odd Magazine and Word Vomit Zine.  He has online galleries at Deviant Art and Instagram. He lives in Daventry, England.

You live in the town of Daventry, Northamptonshire, in England. What is the art scene like in England these days? What is the support for visual art? Is there a fair bit of regionalism?

I think the art scene in England is pretty staid these days. It only exist in most people’s lives when Banksy sprays something on a wall somewhere.  All of the big exhibitions are London-based, with a corporate sponsor. From time to time something interesting will pop up in an independent gallery away from the capital. I usually find out about these after the event. National media focus only on the big exhibitions: Monet or Hockney, for example. Living here these things easily pass you by! So yes, I think there is some regionalism. Read more. 

The Odd Magazine: Oddity 25 is out!

This is the silver anniversary issue of The Odd Magazine, based in Kolkata, India. 

It features poetry by Emmanuel G G Yamba, Jay Passer, Jim Landwehr, Kathleen Hellen, Matthew Friday, Scott C Kaestner and Susan Kotler.

There is also short fiction by Jacob Rousseau, Jamie Brown, Kenneth Pobo, Louella Lester, Paul Beckman and Stephen Nelson.

Art contributions are from Belinda Subraman, Michael Noonan and Serge Luigetti.

And last but not least, an interview with British artist Paul Warren by Gary Cummiskey.

Check out Oddity 25 here!

Completely autonomous: an interview with Armando Fragale in The Odd Magazine 24

Armando Fragale is a multifaceted artist born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1985. He is a painter, illustrator, filmmaker, actor, musician, writer, poet, designer, and producer who works in various mediums. He developed the artistic technique called Drivage and founded the art movement Openism. He has shown his work all over the world and has also collaborated with a wide array of artists in various art forms. Notable exhibitions he has been involved in have been Cosmic Unity: Occult Art and Music in Latin America in New York, International Surrealism Exhibition in Cairo/Saint-Cirq-Lapopie and The Cabinet of the Solar Plexus: The Liminal and the Marvellous, in Dublin. He also runs a record label Wraith Productions, which he started in 2005. Read the interview here.

Against all odds - Oddity 24 is out!

 Back with a Bing-Bong, after 2 rounds of COVID, nightmares and odd, odd times!

 Dig in to the one, the only, your nook of oddness hitting the mid-20's!

 ODDITY 24 !!

 You can also follow the link:  

https://theoddmagazine.wixsite.com/oddity-24

 

The Odd Magazine is honoured to present:

 Odd Poetry: Joan McNerney, Ken Pobo, and Tohm Bakelas

Odd Art: Cecilia Martinez, and Cynthia Yatchman

Odd Interview: Armando Fragale in conversation with Gary Cummiskey

Odd Shorts: Cheryl Snell, Doug Jacquier, Doug Mathewson, Fran Turner, and Michael F Cocchiarale

Cover Photography: Soham Gupta

 

Odd Interview with Richard Fox

Gary Cummiskey's interview with South African poet Richard Fox in the latest issue of The Odd Magazine can be accessed directly here.

Oddity 23 is out!

 The latest issue of The Odd Magazine is out!

Please enjoy the issue at: https://theoddmagazine.wixsite.com/oddity-23

In it you can read:

Odd Poetry: Angelline Schellenberg, Gordon Meade, Ivan de Monbrison, Mathew Friday and rob plath

Odd Shorts: Catfish McDaris, Glen Armstrong, Keith Hoerner, Liam Pezzano, Mark Russo and Peter Cherches. All stories are illustrated by Lizzy Campbell

Odd Art: Enrico Artis, Paul Warren, Lizzy Campbell

Odd Interview: Richard Fox interviewed by Gary Cummiskey

Enjoy!

'Come as you are' in The Odd Magazine

Read Gary Cummiskey's prose poem 'Come as you are' in the latest issue of the Kolkata-based Odd Magazine, here.

The latest issue of The Odd Magazine is out!

The latest issue of the Kolkata-based Odd Magazine, Oddity 22, is out now! The issue contains obituaries for Hungryalist poet Pradip Choudhuri and and artist and poet Stephen Poleskie, was well poetry and prose by Howie Good, Doug Mathewson, Kevin M Hibshman, Noshakare Collins, Louella Leste, Meg Pokrass, Jeff Friedman, Rus Khutoff and Gary Cummiskey, as well as art by Portuguese Dadaist artist Pere Sousa and Kevin M Marlon McClean.

Check it out here.

Putting the work together: an interview with Michael Wilson

Michael Wilson is an assemblage artist who has always been heavy on technique using artifacts and disassembled objects from an era long gone. He avoids plastics to make his assemblages look as though they were antiques themselves. Stuff from the dustbin, collected up and transformed. A solid piece needs to have electricity and some of them literally do. That's when a viewer’s responses can be very strong. 

How did you come to be an artist? How did you come to work in assemblage, and where do you find your materials?

Growing up In the 1960s I was influenced by my father's art and love of jazz. He was a well-known animator and artist, so I grew up in an environment that proved a lifelong Influence. Another big influence was André Breton.  More

Rock and counterculture: an interview with Benoît Delaune

The latest issue of The Odd Magazine contains an interview with French musician, teacher and writer Benoît Delaune, conducted by Gary Cummiskey. 

Born in 1973, Delaune wrote his PhD about William Burroughs and the use of the cut-up technique in the ‘Nova Trilogy’. He also wrote a short biography of Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band, as well as theoretical texts and articles about the collage/montage aesthetics in literature, cinema and music. Between 1998 and 2003, he led a micro-publishing structure, Les éditions de la Notonecte, which released books by Claude Pélieu, Mary Beach, FJ Ossang and others. As a musician, he played in many avant-garde bands, close to free-rock and  improvisation. Nowadays he plays guitar, composes and creates artworks for his new band, Orgöne. He's also working on books by Claude Pélieu and Alain Jégou.

You can read the interview here, in both English and French.

'Pessoa's sister' by Gary Cummiskey in The Odd Magazine

Check out the latest issue of The Odd Magazine for a disquieting, surreal short story called 'Pessoa's sister' by Gary Cummiskey.

'Pessoa's sister' is the second story in the link.

The Odd Magazine #20 is out!

Great news - a stunning issue of The Odd Magazine has landed in cyberspace!

Do have a wonderful time going through this stellar issue, curated in a time when the world needs to fight the odds, more than ever before:

Odd Poetry: Adrian Manning, Arja Salafranca, Brian Rihlmann and Wayn F.Burke

Odd Shorts: Charlei Swailes, Gary Cummiskey, Kari Gillespie, Robert Keith and Yrik-Max Valentonis

Odd Art: Collaborations: Don Yorty-Md Akram, Jan Theuninck-Herman Van Rompuy, Margarita Serafimova-Milen Neykov , Neeti Banerji (Text and Art)

Odd Video: ‘Round Around’ – a film by Yogi Rajput

Odd Interview of Benoit Delaune by Gary Cummiskey (in English and French)

A circular journey: an interview with Musawenkosi Khanyile, published in The Odd Magazine 19

Musawenkosi Khanyile was born in 1991 in Nseleni, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. He holds a Master’s in Clinical Psychology from the University of Zululand, a Master’s in Creative Writing from the University of the Western Cape and is currently studying towards a Master’s in Public Health at the University of Cape Town, where he also works as a Student Counsellor. His chapbook, The Internal Saboteur, was published as part of the African Poetry Book Fund’s 2019 New-Generation African Poets: A Chapbook Box Set (Sita). His first full collection, All the Places, was also published in 2019, by Uhlanga. His work has appeared in literary journals, both local and international, such as New Coin, New Contrast and Five Points. He currently lives in Cape Town. Read more here.

Dye Hard Interviews: John Dorsey: Hittin' the road

John Dorsey lived for several years in Toledo, Ohio. He is the author of several collections of poetry, including Teaching the Dead to Sing: The Outlaw's Prayer(Rose of Sharon Press, 2006), Sodomy is a City in New Jersey (American Mettle Books, 2010), Tombstone Factory (Epic Rites Press, 2013), Appalachian Frankenstein (GTK Press, 2015), Being the Fire (Tangerine Press, 2016) and Shoot the Messenger (Red Flag Press, 2017).  More recently he has published a limited-edition chapbook titled Dying like Dogs, published by Tangerine Press.  He is the current Poet Laureate of Belle, MO. His work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. He can be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.

DH: When did you start writing poetry? When was your first collection published?

JD: I started writing very bad poetry about 30 years ago. My first collection, which contained much of that early work, was published in 1995 by Jesse Poet Publications, and was entitled When It's Over and Other Poems.  Read more.

A History of Visual Text Art

The most recent issue of Kolkata-based The Odd Magazine has a special feature devoted to a newly published book by Karl Kempton titled A History of Visual Text Art. Together with a introduction by Kempton, a gallery of sample images, as well as link to download the book itself, there is an interview with Kempton and publisher Philip Davenport about the book, conducted by Gary Cummiskey. Well done to Odd Magazine editor Sreemanti Sengupta for putting this rewarding and indispensable project together!