On July 31, 2009, at 12 noon EST, a huge lift apparatus ferried Karen Head to the top of the empty fourth plinth (statue base) in London's Trafalgar Square. Once settled, Head twittered the opening lines of a poem which was then added to, one line at a time via Twitter, by other poets and the crowd. Head is likely the only American to be part of the One & Other "living monument" project created by British sculptor Antony Gormley. The project runs for 100 days between July 6 and October 14, 2009 and gives each of 2,400 people an hour atop the plinth to do whatever they want.

Head, who is adjunct faculty in the School of Literature, Communication, and Culture and graduate communication coordinator, Center for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning (CETL), was teaching in England as part of the Georgia Tech at Oxford program when she learned that she was among those randomly accepted to participate in the plinth project. Her concept was a real-time digital version of exquisite corpse poetry in which a poem is built line by line with the poets able to view only a single previous line. At the end of her hour atop the plinth, Head read the completed poem through a megaphone to the crowd. The entire event was broadcast and captured via a live web stream.

This was Head's third poetry project using digital media. She attributes her collaborative spirit to the environment within the School of Literature, Communication, and Culture and its James and Mary Wesley New Media Center.

"Too many people have come to think of art as something that happens when one artist creates something and then other people, in a very individualized way, experience that creation. This is especially true for something like poetry. But, it doesn't have to be this way. My hour on the plinth was a way to stand there with others standing (in the square and virtually) with me."

Gormley's One & Other Project