A Visit to the Gallery

by Richard W. Tillinghast (Editor)

Thirty poets and fiction writers were recently invited to visit the University of Michigan Museum of Art on the occasion of its fiftieth anniversary to pick a work of art that appealed to them, and then to write a poem or prose piece in response. A Visit to the Gallery, where the written works are printed side-by-side with full-color reproductions of the works of art, is the stunning result of these encounters between the visual and literary arts.


A Visit to the Gallery takes its place in the long tradition of poets writing about painting. In the twentieth century this tradition includes well-known poems like "Musée des Beaux Arts" by W. H. Auden and "Why I Am Not A Painter" by Frank O'Hara, who was a curator at the Museum of Modern Art.


Award-winning poet Richard Tillinghast edited and wrote an introduction for the book. Included in the collection are some of Michigan's best known writers, including Diane Wakoski, Thomas Lynch, Charles Baxter, Conrad Hilberry, and MacArthur fellows Alice Fulton and Thylias Moss. Molly Peacock from New York, Robert Pinsky from Boston, and Mary O'Malley from Ireland also contributed to the project.

Genres: Poetry

144 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 1997