“The title of the exhibition – Textual Porosity – draws from ideas about porous interchanges between bodies and words and their surroundings.”
 
This exciting show brings together, for the first time, a range of work by poets and artists Caroline Harris, Briony Hughes and Astra Papachristodoulou. All three have published poetry books, shown work internationally, and have pieces in collections including the National Poetry Library, UK and Bavarian State Library, Germany. All three also have local links. Astra and Briony are based in Surrey, while Caroline grew up in Kingston upon Thames. “It’s one of those strange and wonderful twists of life to be coming back here,” says Caroline. “I spent many hours of my childhood and teens in Bushy and Richmond Parks – which is perhaps one reason why my current work is so focused on deer!” 
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Astra has been exploring different ways of making poetry relating to bees. She uses materials such as beeswax, and has also been advocating for these insects, which are under threat for a range of reasons. A key theme of the pieces Briony is exhibiting is water: she has used water from the Thames (carefully sterilised!) to make her own paper, and for another piece has hand-marbled a long scroll poem about weather phenomena. 
 
The title of the exhibition – Textual Porosity – draws from ideas about porous interchanges between bodies and words and their surroundings. As the exhibition catalogue says: “Interacting with poems that you want to touch so you can feel their texture, that move in the breeze, that can be carried on a demonstration, shifts poetry into something to be experienced not only intellectually or emotionally, but with the body.”