photo of Heather Sticka with Tsumi by Shannon Claire
by Sally Deskins | Les Femmes Folles
Heather Sticka is creator of The Dirty Haiku Project, writing risque Haiku poetry on her friends’ and volunteers’ bodies and having them photographed. She’s also rhythm guitarist and vocalist in Tsumi, an indie-rock band out of Lincoln. She is speaking at Pecha Kucha Lincoln May 1 about Dirty Haiku and generously shares with Les Femmes Folles about how it came about, her musicality, feminism and more.
Tell me about your background.
I was born and raised in Norfolk, Neb., until I was 18. I moved to Iowa for a year then settled here in 1999. Been in Lincoln ever since.
How did you get into music and writing and body art?
I got into music in high school. I loved live shows and we'd have 5-4-5’s (five bands for five bucks) once or twice a month and the bands were phenomenal. I made friends, and started learning to play from them. I wrote my first song about two months after picking up a guitar. I was 17.
Poetry to me had always meant writing lyrics. I didn’t start actively reading it until about two years ago. Since then I’ve been trying to be more conscious of the poetic quality of my lyrics. Haiku for me has just been a way to cleverly text up until last December. I never dreamed that something silly would turn into a big project like this.
I’ve never created body art before. I have four tattoos, and only one of them is my own art. The idea of writing the haiku on skin was just a weird thought I had. “Hmm… I wonder if this would be cool?” Now, because I’ve never done body art before, I didn’t think about the actual process of grabbing my friends’ bits and pieces in order to inscribe upon them.
Photo by Liliedahl Imaging
Tell me about The Dirty Haiku project and why it's important to you.
I think the biggest reason this project is important to me is because it’s so big and so fun and so COMPLETELY new! If you think about it, Tsumi is just three people besides me and the rest of my art I’ve done solo. I’ve had models before but only one at a time.
The Dirty Haiku Project has a potential of over 30 models, I’m working with Rob Liliedahl (amazing photographer, wonderful man), and I’m going to (hopefully) have an assistant for the whole day, too. I’ve never written 69 poems on ONLY one topic before, which is really difficult after 20. I’ve never directed a photo shoot before. I’ve never had to plan out thumbnails for every shot, block out a schedule (I want to do 20 models in 12 hours)… This whole thing feels like the last leg of climbing a mountain. I can see the summit but I have no idea what’s up there and I’m loving that.
Does feminism play a role in your work?
I don’t think feminism plays a role in my work. I will fight just as hard for a man as for a woman and I do not like sexism in any form. I love my boys, I love my girls. The women in my life taught me about art and the men taught me music. I would not exist without both of them. My mother was the one who taught me that.
Do you think Nebraska is a good place for women in the arts?
I really think that Nebraska is amazing for it acceptance of women in art and music. It wasn’t always that way and, I’ll admit, I have run into some real asshats at gigs, music stores, and galleries. I truly believe that anymore it’s not too big of a problem and if you’re woman enough to get mad about someone treating you badly you should be woman enough to call them out politely too.
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Check out Tsumi here. For more on The Dirty Haiku Project, become a fan of Heather Syren on Facebook, visit heathersyren.com or come to Pecha Kucha Lincoln May 1 — details here.