Today we’d like to introduce you to Jennifer Overfield.
Jennifer, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
Lucinda Cobley and I met in 2013 when she and June Woest curated a poem of mine into an outdoor sculpture exhibition in Russ Pitman Park, HTX. In 2020, we reunited to discuss the relationship between poets and visual artists throughout time. We shared abstract and deceptively minimalist styles and mutually admired the works of Emily Dickinson, particularly her envelope poems. If you aren’t familiar with those pieces, they must be looked up. They cannot be described.
The initial meetings between Lucinda and I evolved into small projects, which manifested over a five year period into a rare, multimedia, fine art collaboration between us, Jessica Snow (Glacial Speed Press), and composer, Bruce Chao. Together, we made a fine press chapbook with an audio accompaniment titled, That Same Dream. The project is situated firmly in the realm of art-object literature and will release in December 2025.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
We didn’t work with a timeline until the final months of the project, so trial and error was padded with a lot of leeway time-wise. We paced ourselves on the project and we lived life. Jessica relocated to another state, we suffered the loss of two family members, and we witnessed my daughter begin and finish high school. I completed a separate book, entered into a milestone decade, and so on. These were never setbacks however, but part of a shared history.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
Poetry originates from the Greek “poiesis,” which means, “to make.” Someone in antiquity decided that of all functional, tangible, and beautiful things a human can do, poetry encapsulates what it means to make something. I am proud to be a thread in this tradition, and to be unknown and undiscovered. I believe that is the most exciting aspect of my work.
What matters most to you? Why?
Surprise. I want my mind to think things it has never thought before. There are many moments of surprise in this book: A sudden noise “falling to its knees,” or a bird flying away “when I think of it,” etc. These are moments that invert my orientation to the physical world and to reality.
Pricing:
- That Same Dream $325 USD
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.thatsamedream.com
- Instagram: @jnoverfield
- Youtube: https://youtu.be/yu1J14V763A?si=uIkqcplyVW2sLk15
Image Credits
Jeremiah Grownowski and Jessica Snow
