Ekphrastic Writing Challenge: Omar Odeh

Untitled, by Omar Odeh (Canada, b. Iraq) 2011.

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 Jean-Michel Basquiat, which ends today at midnight. (Click here to see the Basquiat challenge.) Accepted responses for the Basquiat writing challenge will be published on March 1, 2019. 

The prompt this time is Untitled (Two Women With Cat), by Omar Odeh. Deadline is March 8, 2019.


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 [email protected]. 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 OMAR ODEH 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, March 8, 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, Joan Leotta, and Jordan Trethewey.

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!