Writing Home: Ekphrasis, Image-Making, and Poetic Forms with Summer Tate

Writing Home: Ekphrasis, Image-Making, and Poetic Forms In conjunction with Re|Sounding, now on view, join Maine Maritime Museum this spring and summer for an artist workshop and lecture series. Each month from May through August, we are hosting a different contributing artist for a unique learning experience, each examining art as a tool for exploring histories, and uncovering how historical and cultural contexts can influence art.  Each of the four artists leading these interdisciplinary workshops will bring a distinctive approach to exploring both local and personal histories through art. Come learn more about their individual craft and get a better glimpse inside their process, before practicing it yourself! This generative workshop expands on the lecture by inviting participants to write poems that explore “Home” as place, inheritance, memory, imagined return, and the personal archives we carry (photos, objects, documents, and stories). Using ekphrastic methods (writing in response to art and objects) as a doorway into imagery, we’ll practice “writing what we see” while also noticing what’s missing, unnamed, or unrecorded, and how a poem can hold those gaps with care. Participants will create poems sparked by visual prompts (artworks, photographs, or objects), short sensory exercises, and guided observation, designed to make the early stages of drafting feel less rare and more accessible. We’ll also experiment with a range of forms that help shape memory into music and meaning, including: Haiku (attention, brevity, the weather of a moment) Sonnet (argument, devotion, turning points) Palindrome / reversible structures (echo, return, mirror—useful for writing the way “home” can repeat and change) Activities include: rapid “image-to-line” drills, a sensory map of home (sounds, textures, objects, light), collaborative metaphor-building, and a form “remix” where writers translate the same scene across different structures to see how form reshapes feeling and story. The workshop closes with optional sharing to support confidence and community, and it can flow naturally into an open mic/showcase for those who want to read new work aloud. Audience: All levels welcome; no prior poetry experience needed. Participants are encouraged to bring a family photo or a small meaningful item/object from home to use as an ekphrastic prompt. Participants leave with: Multiple new drafts, a set of reusable prompts, and practical tools for generating vivid imagery and revising with intention. Workshop attendees are also welcome to come early for a lecture from Summer from 10:00–11:00 am. Museum admission is included with registration. There will also be a culminating workshop exhibition and open mic in the gallery from 3:30–5:00 pm. Choose a cost that is appropriate and works for you. Register Today About the Artist Summer Tate is a poet and educator who teaches in Hartford, Connecticut. Her creative and scholarly work draws on research related to Mala...