Monica Ong was trained as a visual artist but poetry has long been a part of her creative process.  She joins FPP on January 28 to share her work, and we asked her a few questions about her influences, the act of translation, and cultural silence.

Monica in the group exhibition Narrative / Identity at the AC Institute in Chelsea. NYC, 2011.

What kind of connection exists between your poetry and visual art? I love writing within a visual context. The visual space and prompts I create give me something to write “against”, just like a designer receives a set variables in a design brief to create a campaign from. I have never really considered them separate as we often experience them together anyhow – even language by itself is still represented with typography, which carries aesthetic meaning. The context where we might encounter a text is also inherently significant, whether you’re reading a cereal box, a novel, or a prescription. To read more of this interview, go here.