Jude Cowan Montague

http://www.judecowanmontague.com

The Leidenfrost Effect Album of avant-garde song created in Bark Studios,
soundscaped by Dutch composer Wim Oudijk and released by Folkwit Records

Interpreting international news agency feeds through music, poetry and performance.
Jude is an archivist who has worked on the Reuters international news television archive for ten years and writes poetry about raw edits. Her work is acclaimed in the journalist community.

“Jude Cowan has gone where I’ve never seen a jobbing journalist tread before. This is news observed with so discerning an eye that marvellous detail emerges within the poetry. Read her book. We are the richer for it.” Jon Snow, Channel 4 News

“Unlike the daily news that fades from view, Jude Cowan’s images linger in the memory. She creates poetry which finds the humanity amid the horror of our times. Her work is outstanding.” Bill Neely, International Editor, ITN News

Resonance FM
http://www.resonancefm.com

The News Agents
Jude curates the hybrid news-arts magazine show ‘The News Agents’ on Resonance 104.4 fm, London Arts Radio. She started a weekly show from January 2014.
Saturdays 2.30pm-3.30pm

https://www.mixcloud.com/Resonance/the-news-agents-21st-march-2015/

Bermuda Triangle Test Engineers
Since 2015, with Melanie Clifford, Howard Jacques and Nick Wilsdon. Weekly transmissions.
Thursdays 11pm-12midnight

Writing

For the Messengers
Reuters Television News video at ITN – interview by Jon Snow

Talking about my first collection of poetry to Jon Snow (Channel 4)
For the Messengers (Donut Press, 2011) is dedicated to Fadel Shana the Reuters photojournalist who lost his life newsgathering in his home country of Gaza.

The poems look at Reuters news stories from 2008 including a tribute to Fadel, and various other feeds from the controversy of animal shelters in Iran to the opening ceremony of the Olympics in China.

For the Messengers
Donut Press 2011

Paperback collection of poetry
108 pages, r.r.p. £10.00

In early 2008 Jude began to write poems in response to the un-packaged daily news footage she was archiving for the Thomson Reuters news agency. She continued throughout what proved, globally, to be a tumultuous and historic year.

“For the Messengers draws together this work and is a startling document. Cowan has a talent for locating the key details which cut to the human centre of a story and levels a sharp eye and subtle wit wherever she turns her gaze. These skills, allied with a sure poetic gift, help her do justice to the day-to-day journalistic footworkwhich this book illuminates and celebrates.” Donut Press

The Groodoyals of Terre Rouge
Dark Windows Press 2013

Paperback book of poems, prints and photographs
68 pages with colour and black & white illustrations. r.r.p. £6.95

‘For years my friend Kiran Groodoyal and I had dreamed of visiting her family home in Mauritius together. In November 2007, I booked myself onto a flight to Port Louis. Kiran’s brothers own a mini-cab business and drove me around the island to mysterious and sacred locations.

I was overwhelmed by the warmth of the welcome Influenced by an exercise on an Arvon songwriting course (led by Ray Davies from the Kinks) I tasked myself to write an album during two weeks. On my last evening after a celebratory biryani I performed the songs and handed on the instrument to the young Groodoyals. These songs later transformed into poems from the book.

Later, in the printmaking studios at Camberwell School of Arts I developed etchings and monoprints from photos, sketches and recollections. My recollections further transformed during this process

With image and words working in friendship this is a sunny memoir to the life I was lucky to find in this beautiful island.’
Jude Cowan Montague

VIDEO

https://www.youtube.com/user/solarisqs/videos

Dada and improvised international news music videos

UKRAINE: Aids Medication
NORTHERN IRELAND: NI Bomb with iBaby
PERU: Mining Protest
YEMEN: Shipping Lane
CHINA: Marry a Rich Man
RUSSIA: Giant African Snails

Live Performance

with Steve Moyes @ Tuesdays Post
SOMALIA/ZANZIBAR: Displaced People
UNITED NATIONS: Monitoring Douma
ITALY: Migrant Rescue

Visual Art and Installations

MA Printmaking (Fine Art) Camberwell College of Arts
Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers graduate prize

Lionstep – Monoprint 100 x 70 cm

Polarcap – Monoprint 100 x 70 cm

Underghost – Monoprint 100 x 70 cm

Printmaking

I work in the etching studio to create large handmade mixed media prints,
bringing together a range of signature materials such as deep bitten steel
and zinc, scratched aluminium, straw, cotton wool, roughly cut newsprints,
raw pigments. These weave environments embedded with half-narratives.

Music

The Leidenfrost Effect Album of avant-garde song created in Bark Studios,
soundscaped by Dutch composer Wim Oudijk and released by Folkwit Records