Lot Louis Veelenturf, 1/5, home blogger ArtEZ Business Centre
Creative Writing
Last summer I graduated from the Creative Writing program without doing the things I had planned to do. I didn’t write a book or publish a poetry collection. Instead, I founded an online platform for queer art and literature, named First Person.
It’s a personal project, because I noticed that as a genderqueer author, there weren’t so many places I could publish my work without having to answer for myself, my identity and my pronouns.
Right now, I’m working on filling up/shaping/organizing the second issue, which will be presented on November 30that the Wintertuinfestival.
Remember: “You’re not just doing it for yourself.”
First Person started as a question of conscience. I had just completed my thesis about the role of non-binary and transgender characters in Dutch-language fiction (long title, I know) (a role that turned out to be minimal and depressing, by the way) and started to doubt what I had imagined to be my graduation project. The plan was, exactly as I had envisioned when I started the program, to write a book. The reader was to empathize with the non-binary protagonist, and would thereby grow to feel more sympathetic towards people who don’t identify as a man or a woman in real life (people like myself). I started to wonder, however, whether one such story could make a difference. The world in which it would be published was never going to stop asking me why this was important. I wondered whether I shouldn’t focus on changing that literary world, in order to create an opportunity for a whole group of people whose voices aren’t heard enough right now. Once I had asked myself that question, the answer actually came to me quite easily: that’s what I had to do.
“You’re not just doing it for yourself,” is a mantra I kept repeating throughout the creative process. The story I want to tell is much bigger than just my own (First Person is for everyone who feels part of the LGBTQIA+ community and also for people who would rather not identify at all with respect to gender/sexuality). That means I have to keep working to make things as safe and pleasant as possible for everyone who’s connected to First Person. To be honest, I think that should be a priority for every company, foundation, government or educational organization, and it will be something I will express to each of my clients and co-operators: there has to be space to listen to every story. Especially if that story hasn’t been told very often or has only been told in one-sided ways. Founding First Person was the start of a journey to find a place I could feel home at. A search for a family, you could say. I’ve found that family, and the feeling that these people give me – the sense of being seen and understood – is a feeling I wanted to share.
Practically, starting First Person was way out of my comfort zone. I am familiar with writing short stories and poems, not with budgets, market analyses and business plans. It was especially difficult to get used to sending a huge number of e-mails every day. Suddenly, I was at the wheel of a big operation and I was the one responsible for motivating all these people involved, including myself. What I learned over time, by trial and error, was to keep things personal and not to underestimate people. In my graduation presentation, that meant the following:
The website was built by my colleague Oscar van Leest, the logo and poster on the back of the zine we’re publishing are made by Clodagh Read, my partner, and the launch of First Person took place at WALTER books (which has been the source of my mostly English-language queer content for years). That event was open to everyone who was interested, including people outside of the queer community.
While First Person was intended in the first instance for queer artists and writers, I think that the publication of their work can also lead to new connections between our community and those outside of it. (Let’s not underestimate anyone!) That’s also why I decided to do the event in English, for those who didn’t speak Dutch, and to make it free of charge. This course of action, of making everything as accessible as possible, will continue to apply to every decision I make concerning First Person.
Fortunately, I no longer make these decisions alone. That wouldn’t be right: I’d end up in a kind ofgatekeeper role and it couldn’t possibly be a fair situation for everyone. I’ve formed a kind of editorial office, which will hopefully grow in the coming years, so that even fewer perspectives will escape our purview. In the coming year, we’re going to publish two issues and hopefully bring in a big subsidy for the years after.
I’m comfortable with the fact that I can’t say all that much about the future. First Person will keep growing and I hope the same goes for my personal writing practice. At any rate, I will keep writing, performing and publishing. I’m playing with the idea of giving awareness trainings in high schools and designing workshops combining image and language for elementary schools. I think it’s good from an entrepreneurial perspective to keep exploring what else you can do, to keep reinventing yourself, but above all to find the things that make your heart beat faster. After graduating, you are the only one who can motivate yourself and you can only sell your idea if you believe in it one hundred percent.
If you’re about to start your new program – but I think this advice applies to any kind of situation you might find yourself in – I would want to ask you to be critical. Ask yourself if the whole story is being told, or whether a perspective is missing. And ask if you can make a meaningful contribution, or maybe it’s your time to just be quiet for a moment. And above all: follow your intuition, keep questioning yourself, and do something you never planned to do. Maybe you’ll end up making something valuable for another, and you might just discover a community of people that truly make you feel at home.
First Person can be found on
Translation by: Witold van Ratingen
Lot Louis Veelenturf - Creative Wrinting ArtEZ
2019 - Last summer I graduated from the Creative Writing program without doing the things I had planned to do. I didn’t write a book or publish a poetry collection. Instead, I founded an online platform for queer art and literature, named First Person. It’s a personal project, because I noticed that as a genderqueer author, there weren’t so many places I could publish my work without having to answer for myself, my identity and my pronouns. photography Leroy Verbeet.