IV Kerouac Festival New York

Inspired by the Beat Generation, artists from all over America and Spain meet in the Big Apple for three days of concerts, recitals and poetic actions, in a contemporary sample of the different forms that poetry can adopt: slam, spoken word, hip hop, soul, stand up poetry or performance.

The European children of the Beat Generation

Sixty years ago the Beat Generation changed the established order with its way of understanding poetry. Today, the European children of that generation, influenced and inspired by the catalytic effect of their work and their actions, return to the place where everything began –New York– and initiate a new process: The construction of a bridge that unites the old world and the new, in an invitation to cultural exchange, to the opening of borders, to the promotion of synergies, to the development of new visions and mutual projects, based on artistic collaboration, sharing languages and offering resources, with the undeniable certainty that working together we will build a better world.

Artists and poets united in four days of cultural activities throughout the city

The poet and performer Marina Oroza from Barcelona, the experimental poet Rocío Cerón from Mexico City and the soul singer Wöyza from Vigo are the most visible heads in an edition that clearly focuses on women as exponents of culture, in an incipient need to amplify the feminine voice as a motor for social change and open door to modernity and cultural evolution in the XXI century.

From the Bronx, Nuyorican performer Jani Rose, and Spanish national poet Ana Vidal, who currently writes for El País Semanal, and visual artist Vanesa Álvarez with Kathryn strobel, who have just published their first illustrated book of poems, will offer a concert, a recital and a presentation respectively.

The poets and cultural activists in New York Courtney Surmanek, Marina Sofía Lima, RK Pérez, Salomé Egas or the Venezuelan Keila Vall, are other powerful female voices that will also participate in this fourth edition of the festival.

Poets raise their voices

Also from New York, slamers Anthony McPherson and Chis Campanioni, the first champion of several slams of the city and the second of Cuban roots, the mythical Bob Holman, founder and owner of the Bowery Poetry Club, the poet and journalist E.R. Pulgar, both participants of the last edition of the Kerouac Festival in Vigo (Spain).
And from Spain come the poet and cultural agitator Marcos de la Fuente, who will present and conduct the events in its three venues, and the Galician poet Francisco Álvarez Koki, who currently resides in La Guarda, but who spent many years as an emigrant in New York. Poet and videomaker José Lameiras will also participate with a videopoem.

From Washington comes the poet and journalist Alberto Avendaño, founder of the mythical group of poetic action Rompente, a pioneer collective of the change of poetic paradigm in the Spain of the 80s.

Networks, bridges and outstretched hands

Establishing networks of participation and collaboration is one of the main objectives of the festival. Value the Spanish and Galician language in the USA is another. Eradicating prejudices and unifying efforts towards the propagation of culture as a necessary instrument to transform and improve society is also the goal. Placing poetry as a good for everyday consumption, improving language and thus coexistence, is the challenge. Year after year, poetry is increasingly consumed and valued as something necessary that elevates our senses and those of those around us.