1. What does Visual Poetry mean to you?
From the earliest years of the 20th century, the verbal poetic system experimented with successive disintegrations, first with the breakdown of rhyme and rhythm, and then with the appearance of free verse. Then words began spreading onto the page, giving poems a graphic configuration. Thus, visual poetry is the possibility of a poetic of visuality where the plastic sign is able to perform a poetical function.
2. Who were and/or are your sources of inspiration, your models (either poets or artistic movements) in this artistic medium?
My inspiration sources were many, the main ones being Mallarmé’s "Un coup de dés," the futurist, dada and surrealist works of people like Marinetti, Soffici, Russolo, Hugo Ball, Schwitters, Tzara, Breton, Apollinaire, Khlebnikow, etc. Also the poets of the ‘Lettrist’ movement, Isidore Isou with his letters in freedom, the optophonetic poetry of Raoul Hausmann, François Dufrene, the Vienna group, like Gerhard Ruhm, were very important. ‘Concretism,’ Augusto and Haroldo de Campos, as well as the visual experiments of the Portuguese poet E.M. de Mello e Castro and other poets of the 60s.
3. Why did you choose to create, or why do you enjoy creating, Visual Poetry as one of your artistic expressions?
I chose visual poetry very early in my journey, because the contemporary poetry achievements in the field of intersemiotics (the possibility of the interaction of different esthetic languages) made it possible for me to go much further in the use of the written word, which was not able to translate the vast experiences I was having, in contrast with the new discoveries I was making, as well as my inner uneasiness about what art should be.
4. When did you first adopt Visual Poetry as a mode of expression?
I adopted it as a means of expression around 1986, after the issuing of my second book of verbal poetry. This was the beginning of a new phase that has been included since then not just as visual poetry but, it is important to add, its implications, like ‘objectpoem’, ‘antipoem’, ‘acousticpoem’. All of them have very interesting solutions for my constant searches.