Robert Montgomery is a well-known Scottish artist and poet in Britain, who takes his written words to unusual physical spaces. Last year, Montgomery’s remarkable work in Shoreditch tried to make an impact by using billboards around the streets with unapologetic messages about actuality, politics and also the artist’s graphic poems.
According to the artist, political art is very important at the moment, so that is why he used the “street art” concept to directly tackle the people walking the streets.
The project has found interest as well as harsh criticism on some messages, such as the controversial statement “Sex with refugees is jasmine-scented and beautiful” or other billboards with poems explicitly written during the protests against the war in Iraq.
Montgomery, in addition to the physicality of his works, also creates through social networks: he says “internet is a wonderful medium for poetry… I don’t think this was the idea of its creators, but it was really a nice effect collateral”, celebrating the fact that self-publication is becoming essential online.
As he said “poetry can define the dominant languages we have in culture and now those languages are advertising and the news media”.
