Introduction by Anika Meier

Love Letter: Ana María Caballero

Ana María Caballero seems to have achieved the impossible. The Colombian-American poet and artist has not only won numerous awards, written six books, and become the first living poet to sell a poem at Sotheby’s, but she is also internationally recognized as a pioneer of digital poetry. Additionally, she creates sculptures from books and inscriptions on the Bitcoin blockchain. I still remember my studies in Literature at the university in Heidelberg. The poetry seminars were sparsely attended. We were regularly reminded that poetry doesn’t sell and that it barely makes it into a corner of the culture sections or at literature festivals. In short, anyone engaged with poetry, in any form, should not expect an audience. This has dramatically changed for artists who are as creative and bold in experimenting with new distribution methods as they are with their art.

“Poem = Work of Art.” This is the dictum of Ana María Caballero. Together with Sasha Stiles and Kalen Iwamoto, she founded theVERSEverse, a digital gallery for poetry. As a co-founder and curator of theVERSEverse, she is committed to making poetry accessible to a new audience through NFTs. Some time ago, Caballero said to me during a conversation: “I often say poetry had a logistical problem – it wasn’t easy to transact a poem in a way that reflected its value. Blockchain provenance solves this problem, opening a seat at the art world table for digital poetry that I believe will prove revolutionary. I also think this will result in traditional poems participating in unexpected spaces, allowing new audiences to engage with verse’s power.”

 

 

When reading the three letters N, F and T, one’s thoughts quickly turn to the often-called tech bros, who spend millions on seemingly overpriced artworks (mostly JPEGs, but sometimes even for a banana) to generate some attention for blockchain, cryptocurrencies and NFTs. Caballero does not cater to this audience; she remains focused on her themes that have earned her international recognition: motherhood, societal and cultural rites, the concept of sacrifice as a virtue, and her love for her family.

 

 

Caballero knew she was a poet when, at the age of twelve, she had to bike to buy new notebooks for school because she had filled her previous ones with poems. In her twenties, she started a blog called The Drugstore Notebook, where she shared her writings and thoughts. “I often write as I walk. By moving my body, I connect to the poem’s pulse – that ineffable thing that makes it tick and makes it need to exist. I am unable to put out pretty or intelligent-sounding words; the work must have a point, otherwise, it won’t be able to pierce,” says Caballero, who studied at Harvard and has been living with her family in Madrid for almost two years.

 

Credits
Loveletter by Ana María Caballero

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