By Ogova Ondego
Published July 16, 2011
A movement to promote and strengthen cooperation among poets, poetry initiatives and organisations around the world has been formed.
The World Poetry Movement was founded after a five-day meeting on the status of poetry and poetry festivals across the world at the 21st Medellin Poetry Festival in Colombia (July 2-9, 2011). The meeting, that brought together directors of 37 Poetry Festivals worldwide, also analysed and discussed human concerns and issues regarding difficulties and achievements as part of local organisations promoting poetry, according to a media release issued by the Centre for Creative Arts of the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban, South Africa that organises Poetry Africa festival.
Among the issues discussed were the relationship between poetry and peace and reconstruction of the human spirit, nature of reconciliation and recovery, unity and cultural diversity of people, material misery and poetic justice, and actions to take towards the globalisation of poetry.
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The meeting then formed the World Poetry Movement on the recognition that poetry provides meaningful insights into the human condition.
The main objectives of the World Poetry Movement are to promote the growth of poetry festivals across the world in all their diversity, to enhance communication among poetry festivals and poetry organisations,to promote the development of poetry schools and poetry initiatives, to explore audience development initiatives to broaden publics and access to poetry, and to address issues such as publishing, translation and the general concerns of poets worldwide.
To realise its objectives, the movement is to invite all poets, poetry initiatives and organisations to join the World Poetry Movement whose email address is worldpoetrymovement@gmail.com.
The founding festivals of the World Poetry Movement are:
Tomás Arias, poet representative of Barcelona PoesÃÂa (Spain)
Kwame Dawes, poet representative of Calabash International Literary Festival
Sixto Cabrera, poet representative of Encuentro Latinoamericano de PoesÃÂa en Veracruz (Mexico)
José MarÃÂa Memet, poet director del Encuentro Internacional de Poetas ChilePoesÃÂa
Otoniel Guevara, poet and director del Encuentro Internacional de Poetas El Turno del Ofendido (El Salvador)
Fernando Rendón, Gabriel Jaime Franco, Jairo Guzmán and y Gloria Chvatal, representatives of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de MedellÃÂn (Colombia)
Alex Pausides, poet and director of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de La Habana (Cuba)
Fernando Valverde, poet and director of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de Granada (Spain)
Gaston Bellemare, director of Festival International de la Poèsie de Trois-Rivières (Canada)
Amir Or, poet and director of the International Poetry Festival Sha’ar (Israel)
Iryna Vikyrchak, poet and executive director of The International Poetry Festival Meridian Czernowitz (Ukraine)
Lello Voce, poet and representative of International Poetry Festival RomaPoesÃÂa and Absolute Poetry (Italy)
Rira Abbasi, poet and director of International Festival of Peace Poetry (Irán)
Graciela Araoz, poet and director of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de Buenos Aires (Argentina)
José Mármol, poet and director of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de RepúblicaDominicana
Giovanni Gómez, poet and director of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa Luna de Locos (Pereira, Colombia)
Aaron Rueda, poet and representative of the Festival Iberoamericano de PoesÃÂa ‘Salvador DÃÂaz Mirón’ (Mexico)
Rodolfo Dada, poet and representative of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de Costa Rica
Rigoberto Paredes, poet and director of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de Honduras
Lucy Cristina Chau, poet and director of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa Ars Amandi (Panama)
Marvin GarcÃÂa, poet and director del Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de Quetzaltenango (Guatemala)
Vilma Reyes and Vicente RodrÃÂguez Nietzche, poets and representatives del Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de Puerto Rico
Rafael del Castillo and Fernando Linero, poets and representatives of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa de Bogotá (Colombia)
Gabriel Impaglioni, poet and director of Festival Internacional de PoesÃÂa Palabra en el Mundo (Argentina/Italy)
Ataol Behramoglu, poet and organizer of International Poetry Festival of Smirna (Turkey)
Rati Saxena, poet and director of Krytia International Poetry Festival (India)
Thomas Wolfhart, director of Literaturwerkstatt Berlin (Germany)
Endre Ruset, poet and director of Norsk Litteraturfestival (Norway)
Regina Dyck, director of Poetry on the Road (Bremen, Germany)
Peter Rorvik, director of Poetry Africa (South Africa)
Bas Kwakman, director of Poetry International Rotterdam (The Netherlands)
Céline Hémon, director of International Communications of Les Printemps des Poètes (France)
Zabier Hernández, director of the Recital Internacional de PoesÃÂa desde el Sur, (Pasto, Colombia)
Jack Hirschmann, poet and director of San Francisco International Poetry Festival (United States)
Nikola Madzirov, poet and representative of Struga Poetry Evenings (Macedonia)
Ban’ya Natsuishi, poet and director of Tokyo Poetry Festival (Japan)
Ide Hintze, poet and director of the Vienna Poetry School (Austria).
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