Charles Alexander (poet)
Charles Alexander is an American poet, publisher, and book artist. He is the director and editor-in-chief of Chax Press. Alexander also served as the director of the Minnesota Center for the Book Arts from 1993 until 1995, and as book artist there through 1996. Alexander lives in Tucson, AZ with his wife the visual artist Cynthia Miller and his two daughters. In 2006 he received the Arizona Arts Award and in 2021 he received the Lord Nose Award for excellence in independent literary publishing.
Life and career
Alexander learned bookmaking techniques studying with Walter Hamady at the University of Wisconsin Department of Fine Arts in Madison, Wisconsin during the late seventies and early eighties.Publications
Alexander's books of poetry include Hopeful Buildings, arc of light | dark matter, Pushing Water: parts one through six, Pushing Water: part seven, Four Ninety Eight to Seven, Etudes: D & D, near or random acts, and Certain Slants. He is also the editor of Talking the Boundless Book. Since 1997 he has been working on a long serial poem entitled Pushing Water which is still in process.Teaching and performance
Alexander has collaborated in a poem/visual art mark commissioned by the Phoenix Public Library, created with his wife, Cynthia Miller, as well as several projects with Orts Theater of Dance, including Urban Gaits and Balanced Edge. His poem, Aviary Corridor, set to music for string quartet, piano, flute, and soprano voice by the American composer Tim Risher, premiered at the University of Washington in April 2007, with Alexander as writer/artist in residence. He read for the Double Change series in Paris in June 2007.Alexander is a part-time faculty member at Naropa University's Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics in Boulder, Colorado, Pima Community College and the University of Arizona.