Augusto de Campos
Born in São Paulo (Brazil) in 1931, poet, translator, literary and music critic. In 1951 he published his first book of poems, O rei menos o reino [The King Minus the Kingdom]. In 1952, with his brother Haroldo de Campos and Decio Pignatari, he launched the literary magazine Noigandres, the origin of the Noigandres Group which initiated the international movement of concrete poetry in Brazil. The second issue of that magazine (1955) contained his series of colorpoems Poetamenos [Minuspoet], written in 1953, and considered the first consistent examples of concrete poetry in Brazil. Verse and conventional syntax are abandoned and the words are rearranged in graphic patterns. sometimes printed in six different colors, under inspiration of Webern's Klangfarbenmelodie. In 1956 he participated in the organization of the First National Exhibition of Concrete Art (Painting and Poetry) in the Museum of Modern Art in São Paulo. His work has since been included in many international exhibitions, as well in worldknown anthologies like Concrete Poetry: an International Anthology, edited by Stephen Bann (London, 1967), Concrete Poetry: a World View, edited by Mary Ellen Solt (University of Bloomington, Indiana, 1968), Anthology of Concrete Poetry, edited by Emmet Williams (NY, 1968). Most of his poems were assembled in Viva vaia (1979), Despoesia (1994), and Não (with a CDR of his Clip-Poems, 2003). Other important works are Poemobiles (1974), Caixa preta [Black Box] (1975), collections of object-poems in collaboration with the graphic artist and designer Julio Plaza.
Literature
- Essays
- with Haroldo de Campos and Décio Pignatari, "Plano-Piloto para Poesia Concreta", Noigandres 4, 1958. (in Portuguese)
- with Haroldo de Campos and Décio Pignatari, Teoria da Poesia Concreta – Textos Críticos e Manifestos 1950-1960, São Paulo: Edições Invenção, 1965; 2. ed. ampliada, São Paulo: Duas Cidades, 1975; 3. ed. Editora Brasiliense, 1987; Ateliê Editorial, 2006. (in Portuguese)
- Balanço da bossa, e outras bossas, São Paulo: Perspectiva, 1968. (in Portuguese)
- with Haroldo de Campos and Boris Schnaiderman, Poesia russa moderna, São Paulo: Perspectiva, 1968. (in Portuguese)
- O anticritico, São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1986. (in Portuguese)
- Translations
- Ezra Pound, Cantares de Ezra Pound, Rio de Janeiro: Serviço de Documentação-MEC, 1960. With Décio Pignatari and Haroldo de Campos. (in Portuguese)
- Ezra Pound, Ezra Pound: Antologia Poética, Lisbon: Ulisséia, 1968. With Décio Pignatari and Haroldo de Campos. (in Portuguese)
- Stéphane Mallarmé, Mallarmé, São Paulo: Editora Perspectiva, 1975. With Décio Pignatari and Haroldo de Campos. (in Portuguese)
