Tóroddur Poulsen
Fjalir consists of 33 poems and 33 pictures. The poems comment on the images, the images on the poems. They are integrated and interdependent. The images consist of prints of woodcuts, most of which also include words.
Tóroddur Poulsen was born in Tórshavn in 1957. His debut publication was the poetry collection Botnfall (Dregs) in 1984. Poulsen has subsequently published numerous poetry collections, prose works and in recent years has also produced visual art. Of his poems and pictures he says that for him, "writing has always formed pictures. And vice versa."
The title Fjalir (Planks) refers to the fact that the images consist of cuttings from wood or planks. However, the original Faroese title Fjalir is also a play on words with the verb fjalir, which means to hide or cover something up. The poems reveal that which we wish to hide, from others and from ourselves, and that which we do not want to know.
Faith and existence are recurring themes. The poem "Assignment" and its illustration comment on dreams, faith, and the idea ofeternal life:
in this
windswept
dream
i’m dead tired
on my way down
a steep
kilometers-long
flight of stairs
with a priest
who keeps asking me
how great it is knowing
we also have eternity
to look forward to
and i keep giving him
the same dispirited answer
over and over again
i just want to get home
and go to bed
because i’m totally beat
and don’t want to hear any more
talk of an eternity
that only makes me more tired
The images consists of a tower made of planks of wood with a lot of words, which in turn refer to the poem. Other themes covered by the collection include identity, social conditions, art and language.
Many of the elements contained in the images are tangible everyday objects such as plants, ships, churches, matchboxes and bicycles. Combined with the the words they assume new meaning. Most of the titles of the poems also consist of specific words, often on their own, which are enlarged upon in the poems and images, forming deep existential and poetic reflections.
Tóroddur Poulsen is the visual poet. He succeeds in bringing together two art forms to create a coherent, holistic work, one in which the poems and pictures comment on and complete each other.