Ekphrastic Writing Challenge: Jenn Zed

Louisiana Zombie Afternoon, by Jenn Zed (UK) 2018. Click image for artist site.

Ekphrastic Writing Challenge

Join us for biweekly ekphrastic writing challenges. See why so many writers are hooked on ekphrastic! We feature some of the most accomplished influential poets writing today, and we also welcome emerging or first time writers and those who simply want to experience art in a deeper way or try something creative. 

Thank you to everyone who participated in our last writing challenge featuring the work of Yves Tanguy, and guest edited by Shirley Glubka, which ends today at midnight. (Click here to see the Yves Tanguy challenge.) Accepted responses for the Tanguy challenge will be published on April 12, 2019. 

The prompt this time is Louisiana Zombie Afternoon, by Jenn Zed. Deadline is April 19, 2019.

We are excited to feature regular contributor Jordan Trethewey as guest editor for this challenge!

Guest editor's note:

Hello, ekphrastic-philes! Welcome to your next bi-monthly challenge. Lorette has given me the keys. I said all the right things, set her mind at ease about my driving habits, and now I’m going to put the pedal to the floor and see what this puppy’s got! For this challenge, I chose a piece by an insanely talented, and diverse, visual artist from the UK named Jenn Zed. I have been a fan of hers for years. Her creative drive and body of work is staggering. I am also a big fan of street art as a visual medium for storytelling. This piece caught my eye, reminded me of a Bansky. The silhouette of the little girl with a gun, smoking a cigarette, facing the glare of an indifferent sun, should give all ekphrastic minds out there a running start. Use the title to inspire you, or don’t. I love the undead genre, but am also excited to see how you folks might interpret this scene outside of that context. Have fun. Fire something off. I’m wearing Kevlar.

​Jordan
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The Rules

1. Use this visual art prompt as a springboard for your writing. It can be a poem or short prose (fiction or nonfiction.) You can research the artwork or artist and use your discoveries to fuel your writing, or you can let the image alone provoke your imagination.

2. Write as many poems and stories as you like. Send only your best works or final draft, not everything.

3. Have fun.

4. USE THIS EMAIL ONLY.

Send your work to ekphrasticchallenge@gmail.com. Challenge submissions sent to the other inboxes will most likely be lost as those are read in chronological order of receipt, weeks or longer behind, and are not seen at all by guest editors. They will be discarded. Sorry.

5.Include JENN ZED WRITING CHALLENGE in the subject line in all caps please. 

6. Include your name and a brief bio. If you do not include your bio, it will not be included with your work, if accepted. Even if you have already written for The Ekphrastic Review or submitted other works and your bio is "on file" you must include it in your challenge submission. Do not send it after acceptance or later; it will not be added to your poem. Guest editors may not be familiar with your bio or have access to archives. We are sorry about these technicalities, but have found that following up, requesting, adding, and changing later takes too much time and is very confusing. 

7. Late submissions will be discarded. Sorry. 

8. Deadline is midnight, April 19, 2019.

9. Please do not send revisions, corrections, or changes to your poetry or your biography after the fact. If it's not ready yet, hang on to it until it is.

10. Selected submissions will be published together, with the prompt, one week after the deadline.

​11. Rinse and repeat with upcoming ekphrastic writing challenges!

NEWS

We have been featuring occasional guest editors for the ekphrastic challenges.

We're hoping this will inspire us in unexpected ways, add new flavours and perspectives to the journal, foster community, and widen readership.

Upcoming guest editors include Shirley Glubka, and Joan Leotta.

We're excited about this and about having a whole year of challenges, now that we've found an ekphrastic prompt system that is working in terms of consistency and longevity. Many great poems are about to be written!