A collaboration of visual art and poetry inspired by Funkadelic’s classic albums Standing on the Verge of Getting It On and Maggot Brain, Adrian Matejka's (Pulitzer Prize finalist in poetry for The Big Smoke) new double-chapbook Standing On the Verge & Maggot Brain is a chorus of poems and visual art that is psychedelic and bright, full of quarter notes disguised as words. The poems bend like a solo bends the big ideas of Funkadelic’s glitter and unrepentant funk. Visually, in the Standing On the Verge section, sculptor and artist Kevin Neireiter translates music into stained glass graffiti in honor of the landmark record. For Maggot Brain, Nicholas Galanin’s (also front man of the Sub Pop band Ya Tseen) art creates musical compositions from monochromatics in response to the quintessential album. Matejka's two-in-one collection of poems is synesthesia for the ear and alchemy for the eyes and heart. Standing On the Verge & Maggot Brain is both a tribute to the iconic band Funkadelic and deep introspection in the being-ness of poet Matejka. The poems dance with the celebrant hips just as the album Standing on the Verge of Getting It On, or the poems can meditate in a place of sorrow and courage like the songs of Maggot Brain. Matejka with artists Kevin Neireiter and Nicholas Galanin explore both the light and dark, radiances and shadows.
Praise for Standing on the Verge of Getting It On & Maggot Brain:
“I have always worshiped the poet, the poet is a shapeshifting mastermind bringing emotions, histories, and ideas to the realm of the living. In The Big Smoke Adrian Matejka reminds me that Jack Johnson is America, made in America and a product of its own distorted myths. With MAGGOT BRAIN with word and the memory of a song that is both a sacred lullaby and a fight song he has opened a portal to reclaim a complicated love. — Meshell Ndegeocello
“Adrian Matejka was one of the first poets I read, one of the first poets I loved to read. For all of the reasons that are on display here: an ability to honor the stillness of a moment -- to zoom in and pick apart all of its movements …. It is refreshing, to return to his work once again, and be as in awe as I always have been.” — Hanif Abdurraqib
Author:
Adrian Matejka
Adrian Matejka was born in Nuremberg, Germany and grew up in Indianapolis, Indiana. He cut his first rap mixtape in 1985, but nobody listened to it and he abandoned rap music for poetry. He is the author of several poetry collections including The Devil’s Garden (Alice James Books, 2003) which won the New York / New England Award and Mixology (Penguin, 2009), a winner of the 2008 National Poetry Series and finalist for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literature. The Big Smoke (Penguin, 2013), his collection focused on the first Black heavyweight champion of the world Jack Johnson, was awarded the 2014 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and was also a finalist for the 2013 National Book Award, 2014 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and 2014 Pulitzer Prize in poetry. His most recent collection, Map to the Stars, was published by Penguin in 2017. His mixed media collaboration with Nicholas Galanin and Kevin Neireiter inspired by Funkadelic, Standing on the Verge & Maggot Brain, will be published by Third Man Books in May 2021. His new collection of poems Somebody Else Sold the World inspired by David Bowie’s “The Man Who Sold the World” will be published by Penguin in July 2021. His first graphic novel, Last On His Feet, is forthcoming from Liveright in 2022. Among Matejka’s other honors are the Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award, the Julia Peterkin Award, a Pushcart Prize, and fellowships from the Academy of American Poets, the Bellagio Center, the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and a Simon Fellowship from United States Artists.Matejka teaches creative writing and literature at Indiana University in Bloomington. He served as Poet Laureate of Indiana for 2018-19.
Kevin Neireiter
Kevin Neireiter uses a wide variety of mediums in his art. These include paint, pastel, clay, wood, or any other objects found around his home. Many of his paintings are an attempt to describe what he hears in music. Kevin was thankful to have been asked to create the cover for Adrian's debut book, The Devil's Garden. When he's not making art, he is usually making music or maintaining a Funk shrine. (The Funk shrine is a sculptural homage to Pedro Bell's album cover for Funkadelic's Standing On The Verge Of Getting It On). He currently lives in Seattle with his two daughters and his dog Ringo.
Nicholas Galanin
Nicholas Galanin’s work is rooted in his perspective as an Indigenous man connected to the land and culture he belongs to. Over the past two decades his work has ranged across media, materials and processes; in which Galanin has splintered tourist industry replica carvings into pieces, the rearranged pieces evidence the damage of commodification to culture through photos, objects, and video. In 2020 Galanin excavated the shape of the shadow of the Capt. James Cooke statue in Hyde Park for the Biennale of Sydney, examining the effects of colonization on land, critiquing anthropological bias, and ultimately suggesting the burial of the statue and others like it. In 2021 he created a replica of the Hollywood sign for the Desert X Biennial in Palm Springs CA, which reads INDIAN LAND, directly advocating for and supporting the Land Back and Real Rent initiatives. Galanin holds a BFA from London Guildhall University in Jewellery Design and an MFA in Indigenous Visual Arts from Massey University in New Zealand, prior to which he apprenticed with master carvers and jewelers in his community; he is represented by Peter Blum Gallery in New York, his music ( as Ya Tseen) is released by Sub Pop Records in Seattle. Galanin lives and works with his family on Tlingit Aani, Sitka, Alaska.
A collaboration of visual art and poetry inspired by Funkadelic’s classic albums Standing on the Verge of Getting It On and Maggot Brain, Adrian Matejka's (Pulitzer Prize finalist in poetry for The Big Smoke) new double-chapbook Standing On the Verge & Maggot Brain is a chorus of poems and visual art that is psychedelic and bright, full of quarter notes disguised as words. The poems bend like a solo bends the big ideas of Funkadelic’s glitter and unrepentant funk. Visually, in the Standing On the Verge section, sculptor and artist Kevin Neireiter translates music into stained glass graffiti in honor of the landmark record. For Maggot Brain, Nicholas Galanin’s (also front man of the Sub Pop band Ya Tseen) art creates musical compositions from monochromatics in response to the quintessential album. Matejka's two-in-one collection of poems is synesthesia for the ear and alchemy for the eyes and heart. Standing On the Verge & Maggot Brain is both a tribute to the iconic band Funkadelic and deep introspection in the being-ness of poet Matejka. The poems dance with the celebrant hips just as the album Standing on the Verge of Getting It On, or the poems can meditate in a place of sorrow and courage like the songs of Maggot Brain. Matejka with artists Kevin Neireiter and Nicholas Galanin explore both the light and dark, radiances and shadows.
Praise for Standing on the Verge of Getting It On & Maggot Brain:
“I have always worshiped the poet, the poet is a shapeshifting mastermind bringing emotions, histories, and ideas to the realm of the living. In The Big Smoke Adrian Matejka reminds me that Jack Johnson is America, made in America and a product of its own distorted myths. With MAGGOT BRAIN with word and the memory of a song that is both a sacred lullaby and a fight song he has opened a portal to reclaim a complicated love. — Meshell Ndegeocello
“Adrian Matejka was one of the first poets I read, one of the first poets I loved to read. For all of the reasons that are on display here: an ability to honor the stillness of a moment -- to zoom in and pick apart all of its movements …. It is refreshing, to return to his work once again, and be as in awe as I always have been.” — Hanif Abdurraqib
Author:
Adrian Matejka
Adrian Matejka was born in Nuremberg, Germany and grew up in Indianapolis, Indiana. He cut his first rap mixtape in 1985, but nobody listened to it and he abandoned rap music for poetry. He is the author of several poetry collections including The Devil’s Garden (Alice James Books, 2003) which won the New York / New England Award and Mixology (Penguin, 2009), a winner of the 2008 National Poetry Series and finalist for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literature. The Big Smoke (Penguin, 2013), his collection focused on the first Black heavyweight champion of the world Jack Johnson, was awarded the 2014 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and was also a finalist for the 2013 National Book Award, 2014 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and 2014 Pulitzer Prize in poetry. His most recent collection, Map to the Stars, was published by Penguin in 2017. His mixed media collaboration with Nicholas Galanin and Kevin Neireiter inspired by Funkadelic, Standing on the Verge & Maggot Brain, will be published by Third Man Books in May 2021. His new collection of poems Somebody Else Sold the World inspired by David Bowie’s “The Man Who Sold the World” will be published by Penguin in July 2021. His first graphic novel, Last On His Feet, is forthcoming from Liveright in 2022. Among Matejka’s other honors are the Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award, the Julia Peterkin Award, a Pushcart Prize, and fellowships from the Academy of American Poets, the Bellagio Center, the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and a Simon Fellowship from United States Artists.Matejka teaches creative writing and literature at Indiana University in Bloomington. He served as Poet Laureate of Indiana for 2018-19.
Kevin Neireiter
Kevin Neireiter uses a wide variety of mediums in his art. These include paint, pastel, clay, wood, or any other objects found around his home. Many of his paintings are an attempt to describe what he hears in music. Kevin was thankful to have been asked to create the cover for Adrian's debut book, The Devil's Garden. When he's not making art, he is usually making music or maintaining a Funk shrine. (The Funk shrine is a sculptural homage to Pedro Bell's album cover for Funkadelic's Standing On The Verge Of Getting It On). He currently lives in Seattle with his two daughters and his dog Ringo.
Nicholas Galanin
Nicholas Galanin’s work is rooted in his perspective as an Indigenous man connected to the land and culture he belongs to. Over the past two decades his work has ranged across media, materials and processes; in which Galanin has splintered tourist industry replica carvings into pieces, the rearranged pieces evidence the damage of commodification to culture through photos, objects, and video. In 2020 Galanin excavated the shape of the shadow of the Capt. James Cooke statue in Hyde Park for the Biennale of Sydney, examining the effects of colonization on land, critiquing anthropological bias, and ultimately suggesting the burial of the statue and others like it. In 2021 he created a replica of the Hollywood sign for the Desert X Biennial in Palm Springs CA, which reads INDIAN LAND, directly advocating for and supporting the Land Back and Real Rent initiatives. Galanin holds a BFA from London Guildhall University in Jewellery Design and an MFA in Indigenous Visual Arts from Massey University in New Zealand, prior to which he apprenticed with master carvers and jewelers in his community; he is represented by Peter Blum Gallery in New York, his music ( as Ya Tseen) is released by Sub Pop Records in Seattle. Galanin lives and works with his family on Tlingit Aani, Sitka, Alaska.
