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Jean-Baptiste Cabaud
© www.AnneBouillot.com
Jean-baptiste Cabaud is a french poet, writer and performer. He was born in 1970. After about ten years working in graphic design, he has been devoting himself entirely to poetry and drawing since 2005. As an author, he publishes his texts in books and in magazines. His first book for children, Le Petit Inconnu au Ballon, illustrated by Fred Bernard, and edited by french novelist and publisher Maylis de Kerangal, was published in 2007 and translated in Brazilian and in Greek. His first collection of poems, Les Mécaniques, was published in 2008. As a translator, he translated czech and lithuanian poetry for french magazines and festival organizers.
His artistic work uses various media (book, stage, still images, video) and often meets other disciplines, either scientific or artistic. Exploring the links between tales and poetry, he is looking at isolated spacies and territories (arctic zones, steppes, mountain landscapes, stellar void and so on), technical and scientific utopias, as well as imaginary upsurges in reality.
He regularly gives readings of his texts in France or abroad (Poesiefestival Berlin 2012, Tarp Audiovisual Poetry Festival Vilnius 2012, Bucarest poetrymarket 2014, and Slovenia 2014, Poezijos Pavasaris Festival in Lithuania 2015, Prague MicroFestival 2017), either relying solely on his voice, or bringing them into performances within the electro-poetry band Saint Octobre or in one-off experiences with other artists (painters, film makers, photographers, musicians and so on).
His exhibitions of drawings can be seen since 2013 in Lithuania (French Cultural Institut, Tarp Audiovisual Poetry festival, Regional Library of Klaipėda…) and in France (Art Gallery L’Oujopo in Lyon, Polaris cultural Center of Corbas…).
In 2019, he is asked to join an ethno-artistic team (anthropology, poetry, video, music) set up by the CRBA (Center for Resources of Applied Botany) of Lyon to support a scientific partnership with the Vavilov Institute of Plant Industry, in Saint Petersburg. The same year, he also joins a multidisciplinary think tank (literature, philosophy, history of science, anthropology and biochemistry) supported by the French state research organization (C.N.R.S.) to reflect in the long term on the future applications and implications of restorative and regenerative medicine.
Jean-Baptiste regularly takes responsibility for editorial projects with various groups involved in poetry and throughout the year, he runs in France or abroad meetings and poetry writing workshops in schools, social centres and public libraries, with children, adults or disabled people.
Jean-Baptiste and Saint Octobre have already been awarded various artist fundings and artist residencies by french national or regional cultural institutions (CNL, DRAC Auvergne Rhône-Alpes, Région Rhône-Alpes).