In this conversation with Yolanda De Gregorio Robledo, e-poet María Mencía discusses her journey as an artist and scholar. In doing so, María reveals her artistic interests, the influences the electronic literature community has had on her work, and the importance of highlighting women's contributions to the field of electronic literature as a whole.
María Mencía, an Associate Professor at Kingston University London, is one of the leading artists in electronic poetry (e-poetry). Her work is renowned within the field—having been exhibited at numerous exhibitions, collections, and festivals—and has been broadly studied by theorists and critics. However, there is a lack of interviews to discuss her work, evolution, and influences. This conversation attempts to fill this gap.
This interview was conducted online during the months following the initial COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. It was conducted in Spanish and, thanks to María Mencía’s translation, we now have the opportunity to read it.
In the conversation, we use digital literature and electronic literature as synonyms.
Interviewer: Yolanda De Gregorio Robledo
Interviewee: María Mencía
Time: 17:00h (GMT+1)
Date: 6th September 2020. Conversation via Skype (Cádiz -Spain- and London -UK-)
Yolanda De Gregorio: You were among the first people to defend a thesis on digital poetry. How did your interest in digital/electronic literature arise?
María Mencía: When I started my PhD in the year 2000, I hadn’t heard about digital literature; it was still an unknown field. There were writers working in hypertext and artists using language as the material of their artwork; what it was called language art, with groups such as Art and Language as well as independent artists and writers working using language but without a PhD.
In the ‘90s, as a visual artist with a background in English Philology, I was interested in different art forms including sound art, installations, performance, and videoart. I explored the use of phonetics, alphabets, visual language, and interaction through performances like Speaking in Tongues (1995) and videos, such as From A to Z (1995), Social Interaction (1996), and Learning a Language (1999). I created installations like a b c (1994), Magnetic Meetings (1999); animations like Things Come and Go (1999), Eat Your Words (1998), and The Tongue (1994). This last one was quite significant in my work as it was the first piece in which I worked with phonetic sounds. It consisted of animated graphic figures, representing the inside of the mouth. I modeled them in the graphics used to learn phonetics. These graphics moved in sync with phonetic sounds pronounced at different speeds by English speakers. Additionally, during my postgraduate studies in Art History and Theory (1996-1998) at Chelsea College of Art—in London, in the United Kingdom—I discovered avant-garde experimental poetry, including Mallarmé and his poem Un Coup de Dés Jamais N'Abolira Le Hasard (1897), and Apollinaire’s calligrammes. These greatly influenced my work and—together with my interest in visual, concrete, and sound poetry—I started using digital tools to explore the visual and semantic notions that emerged from these artistic expressions.
Primarily, I became interested in the verbo-visual realm that exists between these two forms of expression and they became the influences and foundations for my doctoral studies in electronic poetry. The title of my PhD thesis, which I also studied for at Chelsea College of Art, London (2000-2003), pretty much summarised my interests; “From Visual Poetry to Digital Art: Image-Sound-Text, Converging Media, and the Development of New Media Languages”. Through this thesis I was able to examine the visibility and semantic aspects of language, and the meaning making derived from the interlacing of image, sound and text. However, at that point, no one could foresee what I would ultimately create, nor did we know how to label these art-language pieces featuring visual-linguistic textualities created using different software packages like Macromedia Director, Adobe Creative Suite, and particularly Flash.
During my studies I took part in many academic conferences and creative presentations at national and international conferences and it was then that I met other artists, poets, and programmers with similar interests, including Loss Pequeño Glazier, John Cayley, Talan Memmott, and Giselle Beiguelman just to mention a few. Loss Pequeño invited me to the second e-poetry festival in 2003, where I showcased works developed during my doctoral studies and met the whole community of e-poets but—as you noted—my thesis was among the first in the field of electronic poetry (e-poetry) and research through creative practice as, practically, many of these creators were not studying a PhD.
Yolanda De Gregorio: On certain occasions, you have described how you poetise narration in your works. Could you, please, elaborate on this for us?
María Mencía: I had not seen this aspect as a method of poetising narratives, but rather as a means to create and understand the poetic-aesthetic-digital space. In any case, I do like the idea of poetising narratives since many of my works begin with narratives, oral stories, and descriptions. That is, with those linguistic elements that are readable before they are transformed into a more visually unintelligible text. You can see this approach in most of my works, have a look at Connected Memories (2009-2010), Gateway to the World (2014-2017), and The Winnipeg: The Poem that Crossed the Atlantic (2018).
These electronic poems fluctuate between the fluidity of narrative, of readable stories and its fragmentation into smaller units—whether graphemes, phonemes, or words—intending to break the linear linguistic-narrative to discover other, more abstract, poetic meanings. This is a recurrent interest in my work, to invite the reader to “look at” and “look through” the malleable, abstract, and, at the same time, transparent text. This interest is influenced by Richard Lanham’s idea of transparent narrative as a way of communicating linguistically and understanding the narrative as such, by looking through the text at the same time as looking at the text; the surface, the materiality, and its visuality. The purpose is to invite the reader to shift from the linguistic meaning to the visual, from the literal, the legible, the transparent to the abstract and vice versa; with the idea of immersing the reader in an aesthetic and poetic experience of visual and abstract signification. This merges linguistic meaning with a more abstract, visual interpretation, which resonates with my interest in visual and concrete poetry.
Another writer and poet who greatly influenced me was Steve McCaffery, particularly his book North of Intention: Critical Writings (1986), which aims to immerse the reader in an experience that exists "outside" language yet still "within" it—because, as Julia Kristeva articulates in Revolution in Poetic Language (1984), once we become linguistic subjects, we cannot rid ourselves of our acquired knowledge of language. Consequently, whenever we see linguistic signs, scattered letters creating a visual landscape, we instinctively attempt to find linguistic meaning. She also discusses the notion of the in-between space where the prelinguistic and linguistic—what she describes as semiotic and symbolic—merge. For instance, in The Winnipeg: The Poem that Crossed the Atlantic (2018), this in-between space is explored through a trans/interlinguistic text consisting of a collection of fluid and fragile narratives that break and disappear—a sea of personal memories, poems, and history.
The reader can access the narratives and archival material linearly through the website and explore them in the hypertextual surface and depth of the Atlantic Ocean Poem, by interacting with words to establish connections and meaning. By clicking on keywords such as "Winnipeg" or passengers' names, which retain the same spelling across the three languages into which the poem is translated—Spanish, English, and French—the reader can find the stories in any of the three languages.
Yolanda De Gregorio: Your digital work is already quite extensive. What developments or evolutions do you foresee in it?
María Mencía: One work always leads to another, but the central focus remains. The evolution of my work goes hand in hand with different tools and what they allow me to do. Additionally, I am very interested in media literacy—how to use it to create new forms of communication and expression and adapt them to the themes I want to explore.
Cultural and social aspects have always been integral to my work. Although at the beginning of my PhD, my focus seemed more linguistic—focusing on phonemes, the materiality of language, and poetic and narrative elements—with projects addressing issues such as cultural identity, translation, and multilingualism. One of my early works, Birds Singing Other Birds' Songs (2001) reflected this already. Other projects include Cityscapes: Social Poetics/Public Textualities (2005), in which I explored how to integrate electronic poetry into the space of social and urban poetics in a multicultural and multilingual city like Melbourne. This project was developed at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, supported by a grant from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) from the UK. In that project, I collaborated with communities speaking different languages in Melbourne, including the now-extinct Aboriginal language Wathawarrung, as the community aimed to revitalise the language.
You have probably noticed all my digital pieces consistently explore particular themes. For instance, migration and displacement have appeared in several works including Cityscapes (2005). I suppose this is connected to my experience of living outside my country of origin for many years. Even though I am Spanish, I was born in Venezuela—my parents were immigrants there due to the events of the Spanish Civil War—and now I have lived longer in the UK than in Spain. This has naturally led me to investigate these themes through creative practice.
Consequently, themes of immigration, displacement, and human relocation also reappear in Connecting Memories (2009-2010), which consists of stories by refugees living in London, and later on, in The Winnipeg: The Poem that Crossed the Atlantic (2018), which also reflects these concerns. This work was mainly inspired by a personal story rooted in events of the Spanish Civil War and its aftermath in Spanish and Chilean historical memory. Another one of my projects, Invisible Voices: Women Victims of the Colombian Conflict (2020) was carried out as part of the project Memory, Victims, and Representation of the Colombian Conflict, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council in the UK. It is a significant project aimed at giving a voice to women and their role in constructing memory through co-creation workshops in Bogotá, Colombia. These involved women from community groups Zoscua and La Ruta Pacífica, alongside a research team from institutions including Kingston University, London, where I work, and the University of Liverpool.
Each work carries a narrative beyond the aesthetic, technological, and visual aspects. I believe it is important for digital literature to use emergent media and new tools to address issues that are relevant to our society, and I am increasingly moving in the direction of projects with a social and positive impact.
Yolanda De Gregorio: What was the reason and objective behind publishing the book #WomenTechLit? Why did you feel it was necessary to write it?
María Mencía: A book by women writers, poets, critics, or academics is always going to create some kind of tension, questioning why it needs to be gender-specific rather than simply about digital literature. I have been asked this question many times. However, it was important for me to highlight and celebrate the importance of the contribution of women in digital literature, and especially also the amount of artistic creation that goes into this field of research and creative practices.
I felt it was necessary to publish this book in 2007 because through my research I noticed that most of the publications were by men. For instance, even a year later, an anthology on digital literature titled The Bloomsbury Handbook of Electronic Literature (2018) was published. Although there is no question about its notable contribution to the field, the gender imbalance is evident; out of nineteen contributors, only six are women, and only five of the twenty-three chapters are written by female authors. It is not my intention to diminish the book’s value but these statistics should serve as a reminder of the importance of promoting a more balanced representation of voices in future editions.
I would also like to clarify that #WomenTechLit (2017) is not a book about women—women wrote it. Each contributor writes about her own research and creative practices, not necessarily about the work of other women. The goal was to give these women the opportunity to publish, especially those who are creators and often find it more difficult to gain academic recognition, precisely because they are producing practical, creative work. This makes it harder for them to progress in academia. I count myself among this group of creators and have personally experienced these challenges as an academic woman and as a creator. However, it is worth noting that men engaged in creative practice also face difficulties advancing in academia compared to those who produce traditional essays or articles. If you are interested in these issues, I was invited to write this article Why #WomenTechLit? Because… (2021) where you can find further studies.
Yolanda De Gregorio: What is your perspective on the role and status of women in digital literature?
María Mencía: In reality, I do not see any difference between men and women in digital literature. I never intended to compare them—everyone has the same capabilities. However, I was forced to focus on the issue of underrepresentation. Even in a research field like ours, where women contribute significantly, men’s work has been given more visibility. This means that the situation for women is always slightly more challenging. If we do not try to showcase our work and ensure it is recorded in history, no one else will do it for us. But in terms of contributions, I see no difference between men and women. I believe things have improved since I edited #WomenTechLit (2017), wrote my article, and took part in this interview in 2020.
Yolanda De Gregorio: How do you see the future of digital literature?
María Mencía: Literature is always linked to the technology of its time. With new platforms, programming languages and software, we will continue evolving and developing languages connected to them, that is literacy. New media will prompt us to consider how we want to express something using emerging technology and tools to create new languages. It continues evolving through virtual reality, social networks, and interactive platforms. Over the years, we have used software such as Macromedia Director and then Adobe Flash, and I have also worked on projects using Processing, WebGL. I believe the future of digital literature will continue evolving alongside new technologies and writing techniques including Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR) and Artificial Intelligence (AI). We are already using them in our everyday life, especially following the COVID-19 pandemic, which made people more reliant on technology for communication and writing. These technologies will become more deeply embedded in our social fabric. That is how I envision it—fully integrated into everyday life.
References
Charla Con María Mencía, un asomo a los caminos de una poeta digital María Mencía, con Ana Cecilia Medina y Vinicius Marquet en el Centro de Cultura Digital, CDMX, 11th November 2022. https://centroculturadigital.mx/actividad/charla-con-maria-mencia. Accessed 17 Feb. 2025.
Kristeva, Julia. Revolution in Poetic Language. Columbia University Press, 1984.
Lanham, Richard A. A Handlist Of Rhetorical Terms: A Guide For Students Of English Literature. University of California Press, 1969.
___, Style: An Anti-Textbook. Paul Dry Books, 1974.
___, Revising Prose. Longman Pub Group, 1979.
Hayles, N. Katherine, et al, editors. Electronic Literature Collection, Volume One. 2006. CD-ROM. The NEXT, Vancouver, WA. Available at https://the-next.eliterature.org/works/917/0/0/ . Accessed 15 February, 2025.
Mallarmé, Stéphane. Un Coup de Dés Jamais N'Abolira Le Hasard, 1897.
Mencía, María. Maria Mencia. https://www.mariamencia.com/index.html. Accessed 20 January, 2025.
___, Birds Singing Other Birds' Songs, 2001. https://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/mencia__birds_singing_other_birds_songs.html. Web. The NEXT, Vancouver, WA. https://the-next.eliterature.org/works/626/0/0/. Accessed 17 February, 2025.
___, From Visual Poetry to Digital Art: Image-Sound-Text, Convergent Media, and the development of New Media Languages, 2003. PhD thesis, University of the Arts London.
___, Connected Memories, 2009-2010. https://www.mariamencia.com/pages/connected_memories.html. Accessed 17 February, 2025.
___, Gateway to the World: Data Visualisation Poetics, 2014-2017. http://lumacode.com/projects/gttw/. Accessed 20 February, 2025.
___, editor. #WomenTechLit. Computing Literature, 2017. Available at https://the-next.eliterature.org/works/1603/0/0/.
___. The Winnipeg: The Poem that Crossed the Atlantic, 2018. https://winnipeg.mariamencia.com/?lang=en
___. “The Winnipeg: The Poem that Crossed the Atlantic.” Hyperrhiz: New Media Cultures, no. 20, 2019. doi:10.20415/hyp/020.mov02
___. Invisible Voices: Women Victims of the Colombian Conflict, 2020. https://www.voces-invisibles.mariamencia.com/.
___. “Why #WomenTechLit? Because…”. Interférences Littéraires/Literaire Interferenties, vol. 25, Oct. 2021, pp. 142–57, https://www.interferenceslitteraires.be/index.php/illi/article/view/1096.
McCaffery, Steve North of Intention: Critical Writings. Roof Books, 1986.
Tabbi, Joseph, editor. The Bloomsbury Handbook of Electronic Literature. Bloomsbury Academic, 2017.
Taylor, Claire, Mencía, María, Asorey-Cacheda, Rafael and Zúñiga-Cañón, Claudia. “Co-creation, digital art and agency : experiences from a co-created digital artwork project in Colombia = Co-creación, Arte Digital y Agencia : experiencias de un proyecto de co-creación de obras de arte digital en Colombia”. Quaderni Culturali, 3, pp. 31-42, 2021. ISSN (online) 2785-5031. https://doi.org/10.36253/qciila-1552.