What inspired you to get into poetry? Did you have any influential role models? 

As a child, I always loved stories and art. I started writing stories when I was 10y old. Also, I’ve always loved talking but I used to stutter and it was quite exhausting for others to listen to me. To improve my speech and finally be able to share my stories, I made the decision to go into theatre class with the goal to work on my stutter problem and also to work on acting. I did theatre for 5 years and within those years also 2 years of musical. When the years were passing, I wasn’t fond of the formation anymore because it was trying to mold me into an artist based on their expectations. The formation wasn’t the place where I could discover myself.  Once I quit theatre, I actually planned to quit art in total because there weren’t lots of people believing in me and I didn’t have a clue what to do in art besides the theatre I did. 

Until I saw Lisette Ma Neza’s performance at Kavka in 2017. I was so surprised and stunned by how she took over the stage. I remember that she took her shoes off before coming on stage and after her performance, I asked her why she was barefoot and reading her poetry from her paper. Two things that wouldn’t be allowed in my theatre formation. She replied that the stage is hers and the only rules that counted were your own. It really opened my eyes, also her way of sharing poetry. I could say that she’s my influential role model. Thanks to her I got a new view of art and eventually found the confidence to share my poetry. That’s started out in spoken word.

I continue sharing my poetry because art is my emotional outlet and a moment of connecting with my inner self but also now that I have an audience, I keep on sharing my art because I noticed (and got the feedback) in which way I reach people. How they are moved by the way I describe feelings that are common for most of my audience but often left unspoken. 

When it comes to dancing, I used to do ballet as a child as well. I quit very soon because of other activities. The dance discipline that I admire and inspires me to work on contemporary movement is a Japanese dance style called Butoh. Translated as the dance of darkness (ankoku butoh). It’s a hyper expressive dance style that you can imagine as a silent theatre. The slow movements, visual expressions, the (mostly) white body-painted dancers themselves are so close to the rawness of being alive that it turns into an intriguing art performance.   

What inspires your poetry? The rawness and passion of your words are very striking!

Pure honesty, the rawness of emotions, the unspoken truth. 

There’s so much left unspoken. We all are thought to keep ‘negative’ emotions for ourselves because we don’t want to bother anyone. Yet you end up bothering yourself by loading your bucket full of emotions that you ignore. 

My poetry is my cries, my intrusive thoughts, my undiscovered desires. I’m trying to express the emotions that I go through in this life as a human being. Of course, I decided to polish my rawness with a beautiful shine. Something typical about me. I see the beauty in so-called ugliness. The cries of a human are so pure that it turns into a piece of art, a flower. I want to hold such ugliness and 

My art used to be for me alone and it still is in the first place but now that I share it, I want the audience to see that there’s beauty in their honest emotions. Embrace it before you’ll critically break it down. 

What advice would you give to artists starting out or to those artists who are struggling with creative blocks?

For the artists starting out, experiment. It’s good to find or already have your way of doing art but there’s a whole world out there. Get inspired, keep on evolving. Also really important, networking. Show yourself out there. Lastly and importantly, find yourself a few supporters. A person that can guide you through your artistic journey and others that give you feedback on your art.

Get inspired by another kind of art. Visit museums, watch opera or dance performances. Search meaning in why and what you’re writing. The message that you’re trying to send out. Read books or YouTube comments under songs with a deeper meaning. Connect with people their experiences to get the ability to sympathize with your audience. Try new things out with your art discipline, do another work process or routine. Get out of your comfort bubble and experience the possibilities outside of it.

What is your creative process and what are the most important things you keep in mind when beginning a new project? Are there any recurring themes/issues you like to address within your work?

I have one rule for my poetry. It should be finished in one go. I don’t allow myself to work more than one day on a poem because my poetry is mostly created by thoughts that have to come out of my mind. If I work on it too long, the structure and the rawness will change meanwhile my poetry reflects my state of mind, my inner thoughts, and feelings. Those aren’t structural and are chaotic before I analyze them critically. 

During the first wave of corona, I struggled with writer’s block. I couldn’t write anymore because everything was too overwhelming to find the right words and my life stopped for a moment. I started with a new process for my poetry. In short, I get inspired by lyrics and write poetry out of them. It can be any song, if there’s a phrase or the whole song that inspires me I write a new poem out of it. I don’t copy the lyrics but I link my own thoughts and experience with the words of the artist and start creating my own work. You’ll mostly not even notice that I got inspired by a song. 

My poetry is always about myself and my experience in this life as a human being. Romance is the most central theme together with sadness, desire, conflicted emotions, adoration, and hate.