Allen Fisher (born 1944) is a poet, painter, publisher, teacher and performer associated with the British Poetry Revival. Fisher was born in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

and started writing poetry in 1962. In the late 1960s, he was involved with Fluxshoe, the United Kingdom offshoot of

Fluxus Fluxus was an international, interdisciplinary community of artists, composers, designers and poets during the 1960s and 1970s who engaged in experimental art performances which emphasized the artistic process over the finished product. Fluxus ...

, and performance has remained an important part of his practice. He established himself as a poet through his early, decade-long, poetry project ''Place'', which was published in a series of books and pamphlets during the 1970s. This project which drew, in part, on the Olson tradition of 'open field' projective verse poetics and, in part, on the procedural tradition of poets like Jackson Mac Low, was one of the major works of the British Poetry Revival, although it wasn't published as a single volume until 2005, when it was brought out by

Ken Edwards Ken Edwards (born in Gibraltar, 1950) is a poet, editor, writer and musician who has lived in England since 1968. He is associated with The British Poetry Revival. Edwards was educated at King's College, London, and at Goldsmiths'. He has been in ...

's Reality Street. After the abandonment (as planned) of ''Place'', he worked on a project called ''Gravity as a consequence of shape'' from 1982 which he completed in 2007. As with ''Place'', this was published in a series of books and pamphlets throughout this period. The total work amounts to some 800 pages. This project was followed by a book of emblems (poem-image-commentary) called "Proposals" and, in 2014, a collage book of poetry, visual images and prose quotations called "SPUTTOR". Fisher also made an important contribution to the British Poetry Revival as a publisher. As editor of ''Spanner'' and "New London Pride", he published many of the British Poetry Revival poets. He was also co-editor of Aloes Books. Fisher has also sustained a concurrent art practice. During the 1980s, he gained a BA from Goldsmiths' College, University of London, where he was taught by

Harry Thubron Harry Thubron OBE (Henry James Thubron, 1915–1985) was an English artist and art teacher. He made radical innovations in art education which are still controversial today. Life Thubron was born on 24 November 1915 at 7 Victoria Avenue, Bi ...

and Elma Thubron. He gained an MA from Essex University in Art History. He has had a number of solo shows, including 'Dispossession and Cure' at the Mayor's Parlour Gallery in Hereford. His last retrospective painting show was in Hereford Museum & Art Gallery in 1993. He has over 150 publications in his name consisting of art documentation, poetry and theory. A book of essays "Imperfect Fit: Aesthetic Function, Facture and Perception" regarding American and British Poetry & Art Since 1950 and other essays on poetics was published by the University of Alabama in 2016. An edited collection of essays on his work from the start through to "SPUTTOR", "The Allen Fisher Companion", edited by

Robert Hampson Joshua Robert Hampson (born 10 June 1965 in Bromley, London, England) is an English musician and composer, known primarily as a guitarist in the band Loop, which he co-founded in London in 1985 with his then-girlfriend Becky "Bex" Stewart. Lo ...

and cris cheek, was published by Shearsman in 2020. Forthcoming:an "Allen Fisher Reader". Fisher is Emeritus Professor of Poetry and Art at Manchester Metropolitan University. He has exhibited widely and his work is represented in the

Tate Gallery Tate is an institution that houses, in a network of four art galleries, the United Kingdom's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art. It is not a government institution, but its main sponsor is the U ...

. He edits the magazine ''Spanner''.

External links

*Allen Fisher homepage
Allen Fisher Links at "Intercapillary Space"
- links to online Fisher poems, reviews, essays and recordings. 1944 births Living people 20th-century English painters English male painters 21st-century English painters 21st-century English male artists British Poetry Revival English male poets 21st-century English male writers 20th-century English male artists {{England-painter-stub