The present study springs from a genuine admiration for John Ashbery s achievement. It aims at exposing those facets of Ashbery s poetry which have been neglected by critical opinion, but which, paradoxically, were instrumental in winning the poet a leading position among the most innovative and daring American poets of today. This study reviews John Ashbery s long-term professional engagement as a visual-art critic and researches conceptual developments and orientations in the visual arts, which have influenced the poet s activity as a creative writer. Tracing analogies between the poetry of...