Cancer stricken artist Fred Burkhart visited Pen, Ink & Song on April 8th to greet a few collectors and gallery owners and to read from his epic poem “A Date with Noah Webster.” This photo retrospective took its name from the recurring phrase in that work – “Patterning the Nerve Speech.”

Fred read the first section of the poem from his wheelchair, surrounded by his photographs. It was a brief reminder of the underground coffeehouses he used to curate, microphone in hand, holding court, cracking jokes, reading Whitman, introducing the next musical act, or simply getting a group of people in a room to pay attention to the moment at hand.

The full poem: http://www.burkhartstudios.com/burkhart/noahwebster.htm

(left to right) Gallerist Carl Hammer, painter Kevin Fair, photographer Edouard Pierre, and gallerist Ken Saunders.

Photos courtesy of Natalie Miller at NGM pix.