VOU Revue de la Poésie Experimentale Number 136 May 1973

Tokyo, Club Vou, 1973. Edited by Kitasono Katué. Staple bound, 21 x 19 cm, 48 pp in original orange wrappers. Illustrated in b/w. Visual poetry publication with essays and poems by Tsuji Setsuko, Kitasono Katué, Uno Takashi, Sugimoto Kinuko, Narayama Fujio, Tabei Takeshi, Mari Nobuo, Luciano Ori et al. Text in Japanese, with a little French and English.

This copy shows considerable flaws, wrinkles and bends, rusty staples, yet a readable scarce item. With stamp of A.I.Po.Ex. Archivo Internazional Poesia Experimental on title page. Vou was the earliest of three Japanese magazines of contemporary visual poetry. It was published from 1935 to 1978, producing 150 numbers. Its founder, Kitasono Katué, established the first contacts between Japanese visual poetry and the international Concrete Poetry movement. The other magazines were ASA, edited by Niikuni Seiichi (1965-1974), and SHISHI, edited by Shoji Yoshizawa (1981-1992).