t thilleman migrated to New York from the Mid-
Western State of Wisconsin in the early 80s. His
essay/poetic memoir Blasted Tower deals with aspects
of biography and memory as well as an appraisal of
informal education and initiation into the world of American post-modern poetries.
For a brief period thilleman worked for Pace Editions and the artist
Chuck Close on handmade paper editions under the direction of master
printmaker Joe Wilfer. During this same span of time tt participated in
readings at ABC NO RIO and the St. Mark’s Poetry Project while
working full-time at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Coralie Miroux
Through-out the 90s he helped edit Poetry New York, a journal
of poetry & translation and created their pamphlet series. thilleman also
participated in the Live Art Workshop that originated out of the Kraine
Theater/KGB Bar on East 4th Street, opposite La Mama La Galleria in New
York City’s East Village. His novel, Gowanus Canal, Hans Knudsen, fictionalizes
the time of the founding of KGB Bar, before it became known as a place for literary gatherings.
From his time in the Live Art Workshop he wove together many
tiny notebook entries for what he would later term strophaic transcriptions
(strophaics, for short, combining the word mosaic with strophe), whose
main poetic reality was generated from the “overheard” and the
“overseen.” His poetry and prose still circles back into and out of the
strophaic as, perhaps, its own "city-on-a-page." Certainly the
wordless stage, at any rate, remains for him a place ever as yet to
be entered.
Over the years he has collaborated with artists
and writers while publishing through Spuyten Duyvil, a
press he continues to work at as managing editor. He is
featured in the documentary, Poetry, New York.
thillemantt at gmail
