Heather Phillipson

Biography
Heather Phillipson is a visual artist and regularly exhibits her work both nationally and internationally. Her poems have been published widely. She is currently artist-in-residence at London College of Fashion.

HEATHER PHILLIPSON: FABER NEW POETS 3 (Faber, 2010)

 * Dr Fulminare's Queftionable Arts -- Phillipson slows time down to the extent that a poem might take place in a mere moment; all its questing energy is taken up in speculation, observation and supposition - the human brain going at the speed of light.
 * The Guardian -- The lines gesture at but don't recreate the condition they refer to, partly because the poet is always accelerating away into the next attitude, but also perhaps because in the climate of popular music the gesture of reference is often confused with imaginative power. 
 * Pen Pusher -- The short stanza form aids her particular affection for staccato rhythms, perhaps a remnant of her training as a classical violinist and pianist, as she piles one acute observation upon the next.
 * Hand+Star -- Her Fine Art Practice PhD has clearly served her well but for all the clever polish inherent in her poems they can at times be too glossy, prissy even as they attempt to inject themselves with true grit.
 * The Wolf -- The only drawback to Phillipson’s too-cool lack of seriousness is that the poems’ emotional weight drops out and the linguistic techniques bare themselves, like neon, over the hard work these poems lack.