unconcerned but not indifferent -
the life of Man Ray.
poems
Ninth Arrondissement Press, 2006,
ISBN 978-0-9553521-1-9,
32 pages, stapled. £5

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Comments:

Derek Adams has made a subtle, reverent and perceptive appreciation of Man Ray, his work and those he loved, a beguiling reflection of this great Surrealist's life and those inseparably linked to him.
Antony Penrose - Director, Lee Miller Archives

If Man Ray invented himself much as a novelist creates a fictional character, then what do we have here? Verse-biography, verse-novel, or Adams' own self-creation? It's probably a little of all of these, and certainly results in a book that is uniquely vivid and remarkable. Drawing on the brilliantly-lit lives of modernism's avant-garde, we are taken on a truly sur-(above-and-beyond-the)-real exploration, in a sequence of poems that are ever exact and inventive.
Maurice Riordan.

In Derek Adams' work we find the spark between surrealism and biography, text and pictogram. The author, like his subject, is always ahead of the game. Whether inventing, researching, or simply searching for, Man Ray's friends, photographs or geographical haunts, the poems in 'unconcerned... but not indifferent' [text, punctuation, paper, glue] are flash lit moments of bright beauty and alarm. Those who pay attention will remember these words in the dark as the redeye burns.
Rupert Loydell, Editor, Stride Magazine

Reviews:

The poetry-biography of photographer Man Ray by poet/photographer Derek Adams is a great idea well done and a snip at five quid.
Purple Patch No.116

The art-forms and artistic preoccupations of the 1920s hold Derek Adams in a trance, and through his skilful interweaving of Man Ray's life and works with poems themselves constructed in terms of shifting focus, interchangeability of perspective and ever-evolving contrasts we are led into his fascination with this epoch. For example, the eroticism of the 1920s, especially in terms of the sexually outrageous, but essentially sexist images of women, is celebrated in Kiki de Montparnasse.
Alan Hardy, New Hope International Review

...part homage to the man, part thumbnail history of Dada, part study of a life as a work of art, and the rest is a chronicle of self-obsession. A neat trick to pull in the space of 23 poems.
Paul Lee, Sphinx 6

Contents:
Man Ray
Born again 1905
The Armoury show 1913
Woman Asleep 1913
Marcel 1915
Impossibilité Dancer/Danger 1920
Flying Dutchman 1920
Paris 1921
Kiki 1921
Rayograph 1922
Retour à la Raison 1923
Kiki de Montparnasse
Entr'acte 1924
Mistress of l'image trouvé
The Sabatier Effect 1929
Object of Destruction 1932
A l'heure de l'observatoire, les Amoureux 1932-34
Max Ernst, Solarized 1935
Picnic at Mougins 1937
Portrait imaginaire de Sade 1938
Pandora and the Flying Dutchman 1940-53
Smoking Device 1959
Cimetière du Montparnasse
Biographical notes

Some of these poems poems were originally published in these magazines

Impossibilité dancer/danger 1920,  Marcel 1915,  Paris 1921 
& The Sabatier effect 1929 - Nth Postition

Born Again 1905,  Armoury Show 1913,  Kiki 1921,  Entr’acte 1924,
Pandora & The Flying Dutchman 1940-53,  Smoking Device 1959 - Stride

A l'heure de l'observatoire, les Amoureux, 1932 - 34 - Magma

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Lee Miller, Duchamp, Marcel Duchamp, Man Ray, Tate, Modern, Surreal, Surrealism, New York Dada, Dada, Paris Dada, Emmanuel Radnitzky, film, painting, sculpture, collage, photography, assemblage, Montparnasse, Max Ernst,Kiki de Montparnasse, Alice Prin, rayograph, exhibition, Juliet Browner