Patti Smith: Dodge Poetry Festival
About This Event
Patti Smith appears at NJPAC for the Dodge Poetry Festival, bringing the interplay of poetry and rock that shaped her work in New York’s 1970s punk and downtown arts circles. Her debut album Horses set a template for folding spoken language into stripped-back rock, and on stage she moves between text and song with a spare, direct manner of address.
About Dodge Poetry Festival
The other Dodge Poetry Festival comes to NJPAC as a live, staged gathering that treats poetry as a public art form, not a private page. Featured performer Patti Smith brings a Rock/Pop sensibility to the program, where spoken language and song share the same room. While the festival’s deepest roots are across the river in New Jersey, it has long functioned as part of the wider New York–area literary circuit, drawing audiences who move easily between boroughs and Newark. The event suggests, quietly, that performance is one way poems stay socially current.
About the Artist
Patti Smith
Patti Smith is a singer, songwriter, poet, and author whose work took shape in New York’s 1970s punk and downtown arts circles. Her debut album *Horses* set a template for folding spoken language into stripped-back rock, and she has continued to move between text and song in performance.