An art-inflected foray into the mind of literary legend Brigid Hughes

May 16, 2019

We’ve been blessed by the brilliance of Brigid Hughes, and if you’re familiar with her work you’ll know how lucky we are to have diverted some of her genius into curating our newest Literary Gallery. Hughes is the founding editor of A Public Space, an innovative nonprofit publisher of an acclaimed literary magazine and the indie imprint A Public Space Books. Now in its thirteenth year, A Public Space has amassed a formidable list of awards and accolades, and its stories frequently appear in the most estimable annual collections. To call A Public Space one of the preeminent literary and cultural publications in the country is an understatement. It’s a revelation from one of the finest minds in literature, a champion of diversity and discovery, a convocation of the boundary-breaking, overlooked, underappreciated, and exceptional.

On October 1st A Public Space Books will debut their newest title: a complete collection of artist and writer Giorgio de Chirico’s as-yet unsung Italian language poetry, translated by award-winning poet Stefania Heim. You can preorder Geometry of Shadows now. In the meantime, get a taste of Hughes’s editorial acuity from her attentively assembled Lit Gallery selections, sampled below. You'll need to head over to the blog for all her print + book pairings, including texts from widely celebrated authors like Amy Leach and Jesmyn Ward, whose careers Hughes helped launch. — Team 20x200

This series pairing art and books reminds me of one of the joys of editing a magazine: thinking about sequences and pairings, how they can open up a new perspective, illuminate something unnoticed, create or reinforce humor, find the resonant in the collective. — Brigid Hughes, founding editor of A Public Space

Things That Are and Collocation No. 14 (NATURE) Left Panel