American singer-songwriter, poet, painter, author and human-rights advocate Patti Smith first found herself in New York during the hippie takeover of 1967, a politically charged summer of free love, activism and riots. She worked in two Manhattan bookstores, Scribner’s and The Strand, and wrote verse, which led to her forming the Patti Smith Group in which she fused her Rimbaud- and Blake-inspired poetry with the emerging punk rock scene.

"CORRESPONDENCES, the long-term audio-visual project by Soundwalk Collective and Patti Smith, documents the sonic footprints of poets, filmmakers, revolutionaries, and climate change across numerous global locations. Following last year’s release of Correspondences Vol I, they have today announced the release of Correspondences Vol II. Accompanying the announcement of the new 2-track EP, out March 21 via Bella Union, is the first fifteen minute track, titled “Children Of Chernobyl”. (...) It’s here, where the natural meets the unthinkable, that the story of Soundwalk Collective and Patti Smith’s CORRESPONDENCES continues. More ghostly still are the same words sung in Ukrainian at the song’s end by the Chernobyl Children’s Choir: “There are roses underfoot that one cannot smell / There is fruit on the vine that one cannot eat / And they went to bed hungry / And hungry they’ll sleep / For a thousand years.”"

Patti Smith will perform her debut album Horses in full on tour to celebrate the LP’s 50 anniversary. The tour will feature feature guitarist Lenny Kaye and drummer Jay Dee Daugherty, both of whom played on the original 1975 recording. (...) A press release notes, “Please join us to help celebrate the final ride of our irreverent thoroughbred.” The anniversary trek will kick off on Oct. 6 at Dublin’s 3Arena, with dates in Madrid, Bergamo, Brussels, Oslo, London, and Paris. Smith will head to the U.S. the following month, with shows beginning Nov. 10 at Seattle’s Paramount Theatre. The U.S. segment will also stop in Oakland, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Boston, Washington D.C., and Philadelphia. (...) The upcoming tour marks 20 years since Smith performed Horses live in its entirety for the first time. She initially revisited the album in 2005 for its 30th anniversary during Meltdown Festival in London, which she was invited to curate that year.

Correspondences is an ongoing collaboration between Soundwalk Collective and Patti Smith, spanning over a decade and traversing diverse geographies, histories, and natural environments.The presentation at kurimanzutto marks the first time this body of work is shown in New York and in a gallery setting. At its core, the project transforms field recordings collected by Soundwalk Collective’s founder, Stephan Crasneanscki, from some of the world’s most remote and resonant landscapes—sites of poetic inspiration, historical significance, and environmental urgency—into immersive soundscapes. These compositions evoke a “sonic memory” of place, embodying traces of revolutionaries, artists, and the ongoing impact of climate change. Through an intimate dialogue with these recordings, Patti Smith channels her poetic voice to create pieces that reflect on the intersections of nature, human history, and artistic creation. Each work challenges the traditional relationship between sound and image, allowing the sonic landscapes to dictate their visual counterparts.

As Tibet House’s highly-anticipated 38th annual benefit concert steadily approaches, the host organization has expanded its star-studded lineup with three new additions. On March 3, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee, New York icon and longtime Tibet House advocate Patti Smith will return to perform at Carnegie Hall’s hallowed Stern Auditorium, alongside Grammy-winning Americana trailblazer Allison Russell and Emmy-winning co-star of The Bear Ebon Moss-Bachrach.

Smith, often referred to as the "Godmother of Punk," is not only a musical icon but a literary powerhouse. She's a unicorn artist who blends music, poetry, and visual art seamlessly, with her works spanning decades of cultural relevance. Best known for her 1975 debut album Horses, lauded as one of the greatest rock albums, Smith's rebellious spirit and intellectual lyricism have made her a key figure in the punk movement.The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee is set to return to the Miami Book Fair this year to discuss her 2022 book, A Book of Days. It's an event she has been participating in as an author for more than a decade. Her most recent book is an intimate window into her daily life, featuring 366 photographs — one for each day of the year, including a bonus for leap year. [...] Each image is paired with a short reflection, combining the mundane with the profound, offering readers a glimpse into the mind of an artist who, in her own words, has "a permanent ticket down the rabbit hole," triggering the reader's curiosity and imagination.

Patti Smith continues to make waves in myriad pop culture and musical landscapes. Known for her iconic contributions as a singer, lyricist, artist and poet, Smith has collaborated with many creatives. Long after her explosion into the rock industry, she has continued to inspire forthcoming generations, leading her to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Her memoir, Just Kids, documents the triumphs and difficulties of moving to New York City in the late 1960s and early 1970s on her own. She carved out a substantial path for herself but that is not without suffering in its many relentless forms. It was there that she met Robert Mapplethorpe. The two of them together, experienced a connection that could be described as nothing less than a soul-tie. From difficult beginnings, the creative destined her own path – one that began with paper and pen.

At the Baryshnikov Arts Center, an adaptation of Smith’s poem-memoir “Woolgathering” features Smith reciting, others dancing and a surprise guest. “Woolgathering” is a slim collection of prose poems that Patti Smith, the singer-songwriter and punk pioneer, published in 1992. It’s mostly a memoir of childhood — of a poet’s childhood, or of the way that all children have a poet’s imagination. “The mind of a child,” she writes, “is like a kiss on the forehead — open and disinterested.” It is “mystified by the commonplace” and “moves effortlessly into the strange,” glimpsing and gleaning, “piecing together a crazy quilt of truths.”

Gentle dub reggae plays through speakers by the North Transept inside St Paul’s Cathedral, while ushers show people to their seats. Hosted by nightclub Fabric, this is an unusual collaboration for a 350-year-old place of worship better known for grand royal weddings, funerals and classical concerts. The seating area is packed to its 2000 capacity, as club kids mingle with a rock crowd, and there’s a palpable sense of anticipation. [...] Starting with spoken word lines from the poem Cry Humanity: “Blessed are the children who will rebuild our world”, Patti Smith moves into the tribal, hypnotic chant of Easter’s Ghost Dance. [...] Subtle, careful arrangements – like Shanahan’s plangent notes on the grand piano – become huge and resonant as they float to the cathedral walls.

On 4 October 2021, a sprightly Patti Smith—dressed in her customary attire: a white t-shirt with a black blazer, black trousers, and black boots—ambles onto the stage of the Royal Albert Hall as if having stepped out into a Parisian street after having been holed up in a garret for months on end writing. [...] Anyone slightly conversant with Patti Smith knows that she speaks out on environmental and governmental issues and personal strife. This, along with her seer-like qualities, screams a prophetic bard. Oh, and that she can write—well. Thus perhaps Smith was always destined to recite “Piss Factory” at the Royal Albert Hall, complete with the tincture of her blue-collar, South Jersey accent emphasising how far she has come. And, even if not, it still worked and lost none of its vatic meaning. Yet this is in recent history, not half a century ago when a twenty-eight-year-old sinewy Smith entered Electric Lady Studios to record “Hey Joe” and ended up with a take of “Piss Factory.”