A unique presence in the world of literary awards, the Bernard Heidsieck Centre Pompidou International Literature Prize was created in 2017 to honor literary creations that unfold beyond the book. The prize seeks to reward the best authors and works in this expanded domain of literature. Hence the choice of sound poet Bernard Heidsieck (1928–2014) as the patron of this prize, which in the past has honored figures like John Giorno (2017), Esther Ferrer, Tomaso Binga (for the honorary prize), and many contemporary artists such as Caroline Bergvall, Cia Rinne, Anne-James Chaton, Charles Pennequin, Kenneth Goldsmith, and Kinga Tóth.
In partnership with and supported by Archivio Conz, the collection of Lettrism, concrete poetry, and the Fluxus movement established by Francesco Conz and based in Berlin, the award ceremony will take place in Berlin on Sunday, September 14, 5 pm, 2025, at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele, as part of the International Literature Festival (ILB). Two prizes will be awarded: the Honorary Prize and the Annual Prize, selected by a jury chaired by the poet Joachim Sartorius.
Nominees for the 2025 Annual Prize:
• Oana Avasilichioaei (Canada)
• Christian Bök (Canada)
• Jay Bernard (United Kingdom)
Honorary Prize 2025: Joël Hubaut
The Bernard Heidsieck – Centre Pompidou International Literature Prize jury has chosen to award the 2025 Honorary Prize to artist, poet, and performer Joël Hubaut.
Joël Hubaut was born in Amiens in 1947. He has lived in Réville (Normandy) since the late 60s, developing a hybrid body of work in sometimes parodic forms, using all available media; his fictional work summons up an aesthetic of dispersion that he claims as a manifesto of life. His meeting with Claude Pélieu and Mary Beach, who introduced him to Gil J. Wolman, Jean-Louis Brau and Henri Chopin, was decisive. He then created “l'Ultralaiterisme pest modern” and “Epidémik Rabbit Generation” in a nod to the Beat Generation. Whether he's tackling the figure of the rabbit, flags, sausages, language or color, Joël Hubaut's work is all about the “epidemik” drift. He is a precursor of mixing and re-mixing, a creator of improbable events (gastrosophical banquets, incongruous and offbeat actions). Joël Hubaut is an eccentric figure and force in the landscape of contemporary art and poetry.
His first signs of “épidémik writing” appeared as early as the 1970s, invading supports and activating a rhizomic process, as in his épidémik performances presented at Artists Space, St Marck' Church, Columbia University and Jean Dupuy's Grommet studio in New York, and later, the infected installation created in live improvisation at Museum Africa, Newtown in Johannesburg, South Africa, with the Wharf. He was invited to the Rencontres Internationales de Poésie Sonore co-organized by Bernard Heidseick and Michèle Métail in Rennes, Le Havre and Paris at the Centre Georges Pompidou in 1978. He tags and saturates the columns of the Museum Fridericianum at Documenta 7 in Kassel 82 with epidemik signs, provoking a brawl. After a pivotal encounter with Charles Dreyfus-Fluxus and Julien Blaine, he became a permanent Doc(k)ers and took part in “Poésure et Peintrie”, directed by Bernard Blistène in Marseille. He asked Félix Guattari to join him in a performance at the Café de la Danse in Paris, as part of J.J. Lebel's “Polyphonix” Festival. "There's a kind of scandalous atmosphere about Joël Hubaut's work. I think he was prophetic or, in any case, a forerunner of the post-modern chaos in which we live", writes the renowned art critic Pierre Restany. Joël Hubaut is represented by some 100 pieces in the collection "The Ruth & Marvin Sackner Archive of Concrete and Visual Poetry, ( Miami Beach, Florida ) now housed at Main Library Gallery, University of Lowa city. Other notable epidemik performances include “Der Sinn der Sinne” Kunst und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, at the Kunstmuseum in Bonn, and his contaminated performances “Toast pour Robert Malaval” with Katia Legendre at the Palais de Tokyo in 2005, as well as the Québec biennial “L'art de la joie”, curated by Alexia Fabre, an in situ installation at lieu-Inter.
''Joël Hubaut is an excellent performer, with a fine sense of timing, a sophisticated understanding of the nuances of sound, and a dramatic yet controlled sense of expressive gesture. As a result, the primitive anger and energy he communicated were both compelling and contagious '' Shelly Rice, Artforum.
Message of thanks for the Bernard Heidsieck International Prize for Literature - Centre Pompidou 2025
''(…) Oh, I can say that I was rather stunned by the phone call announcing the news of this incredible recognition for the Bernard Heidsieck Prize of Honor, Allo! heu! Huh! Let's just say that I was both deeply moved, troubled, and very embarrassed (…) I may be very sensitive and delighted to receive this distinction associated with Bernard Heidsieck, for whom I have profound respect, but it is above all with great humility and relativity that I wish to accept such a majestic prize...''
Joël Hubaut, Réville, June 2025
Joël Hubaut will perform with his son, Emmanuel Hubaut, on September 14th during the Long Night of Poetry at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele, between 7 and 9 pm.
President of the Jury:
Joachim Sartorius, poet, translator, and cultural manager
Permanent Members:
Emmanuelle or Nathalie Heidsieck, daughters of Bernard Heidsieck
Michaël Batalla, Director of the Centre international de poésie Marseille (CipM)
Hubertus von Amelunxen, Director of Archivio Conz
Permanent Members from the Centre Pompidou:
Jean-Max Colard, Head of the “La Parole” department, initiator of the “Extra!” festival
Mica Gherghescu, Head of Research and Scientific Programming, Kandinsky Library
2025 Jury Members:
Lilou Vidal, Curator and cultural producer
Christoph B. Schulz, Literary scholar, author, and art critic
Kinga Tóth, Poet, performer, and visual artist
Mathias Zeiske, Editor and cultural journalist; Head of Literature and Film, DAAD Artists