Viv Fogel’s first short story was published in the school magazine when she was 12, and her first poem was published in Peace News when she was sixteen. Her poems have appeared (under her adoptive surname of Wynant) in small arts magazines and anthologies throughout the 70’s and 80’s. One of the publications she wrote and illustrated for in the early 70’s was Gallery – whose editor was Valerie Sinason – the well known psychotherapist and writer.

Her poem ‘Spaces’ (New Wave Poetry 1974) was the centre-piece of a dance-performance at the Cockpit Theatre and was used by students in Germany researching contemporary poems about London.

‘Memo for Peace’ (Greenham Women Everywhere, Pluto Press 1983) was used as a poster for the Greenham Peace Camp Benefit at the Roundhouse in Camden in 1982. During the early 80‘s Viv was part of the quartet of feminist performance poets The Evettes.

During the late 90’s and early Noughties Viv co-organised many poetry events and benefits, including for Hornsey Library’s Word for Word and Camden’s Irish Centre.

For over thirty years much of her writing has been about her work – spiritually and creatively - as an integrative psychotherapist and as an energy psychotherapist - which is why she’s been too busy to enter poetry competitions, approach publishers and submit to magazines – unless asked. In 2015 she was persuaded to enter some poems for the Second Light Poetry Competition – and her poem Oradour-sur-Glane was highly commended out of almost 1,500 entries, and published in the poetry magazine Artemis. As poet Martyn Crucefix commented on hearing it read – “It should have been one of the winners.”

She is, however, planning a third collection of her own, and an edited collection of writings and poems by others from a meditation and healing circle. She enjoys reading and performing her work – especially when interwoven with music. Her recent lyrics – For a Song for Leonard Cohen – have been set to music – as have a few other of her poems.

“Perhaps because I was an only child, adopted by Holocaust Survivors, I have always written or made art. It made me feel connected and less alone. Ever since, I’ve enjoyed working to enable others to express them selves in one form or another.

The artist in me is inspired by what I see – the patterns, colours and shadows in nature and people, what’s hidden and emerging, how words look on the page. Dreams, peoples’ stories and courage, other poets, my teachers.

Themes are universal – love, transience, mortality and those sublime moments that can happen in the everyday ordinary. Motivation – to reach out and speak to the heart.”

Viv has been an illustrator, a community worker, a family workshop facilitator, a screen-printer, and for over 20 years an art teacher in secondary and adult education. She is also a doting grandmother and for many years has enjoyed singing with a Natural Voice group.

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READINGS

Exiled Writers Ink online cafe 7th Nov 2022, 'All my life I have wanted to be…’

.....featuring poets with an experience of exile: Eve Rubin, Aviva Dautch, Maria Jastrzębska, Viv Fogel, Liz Cashdan, Nazand Bekikhani. Compère: Agata Palmer

If you want to catch Viv reading some of her poems (just 7 mins) at the event - just go to the link - and she can be heard 65 minutes in.

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Below is a selection of some of the publications, magazines and anthologies that her poems that have appeared in. (Poems published before 2001 are under the name of Viv Wynant).

Gallery editor: Valerie Sinason, 1974; ISSN 0306-1256

Pentameters Anthology: editor: Leonie Scott-Mathews, Pentameters Press 1974; 0-9503729 0 0

Next Wave Poets 1975: editor: Desmond Hertzberg, Next Wave Publications 1975; 0-902199-60-4

Greenham Women Everywhere Alice Cook and Gwyn Kirk, Pluto Press 1983; 0-86104 726 5

Stop Me And Buy One Word for Word Wood Green Anthology, Arts Council 2005; 0-9531 781 37

Haiku for a rainy day Word for Word in association with Haringey Libraries, 2003

Writes of Women Word for Word in association with Haringey Libraries, 2003

Poetries 1 (2003) Poetries 2 (2004) Poetries 3 (2005) Poetries 4 (2006) Word for Word in association with Haringey Libraries & Arts

Without Question Viv Fogel, Mandaras Publishing 2006; 0-9544730-5-1

Gathering Diamonds from the Well New Gallery Books 2007; 0-978-09531-781-48

Resident Alien: A Festschrift for Doris Dembosky Silver Fox Press 2008 

A Shake of Stars: Poetry and Prose editor:John Mackay, Morton Press 2008

Artemis Second Light: May 2012; November 2015; November 2017; ISSN 2045-4686

Witness Viv Fogel, Mandaras Publishing 2013; 9 781906 168131

How it is... Homebound Poetry 2018; Homemade Books